UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


SPEECHES,   ADDRESSES, 


OCCASIONAL    SEEMONS, 


THEODORE    PARKER, 


IN    TWO    VOLUMES. 
VOL.     I. 


BOSTON: 
WM.   CROSBY    AND    H.    P.  NICHOLS. 

NEW  YORK  :    C.  8.  FRANCIS  A  COMPANY. 
MDCCCLII. 


144598 


Entered  according  to  the  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1851,  by 

THEODORE    PARKER, 
In  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts. 


:-:  /:  •'•  •'.'•  ' 
.  • .  ,*  •  * 


BOSTON: 

TIlrRSTOS,  TOBRT,  AND   KMERSOX,   PRISTKR3. 


PREFACE. 


I  HAVE  collected  in  these  two  volumes  several  Speeches, 
Addresses  and  occasional  Sermons,  which  I  have  delivered 
at  various  times  during  the  last  seven  years.  Most  of  them 
were  prepared  for  some  special  emergency :  only  two 
papers,  that  on  "  The  Relation  of  Jesus  to  his  Age  and 
the  Ages,"  and  that  on  "  Immortal  Life,"  were  written 
without  reference  to  some  such  emergency.  All  of  them 
have  been  printed  before,  excepting  the  sermon  "  Of  Gen- 
eral Taylor,"  and  the  address  on  "  The  American  Scho- 
lar;" some  have  been  several  times  reprinted.  I  do  not 
know  that  they  are  worthy  of  republication  in  this  perma- 
nent form,  but  the  leading  ideas  of  these  volumes  are  very 
dear  to  me,  and  are  sure  to  live  as  long  as  the  human  race 
shall  continue.  So  I  have  published  a  small  edition,  hoping 
that  the  truths  which  I  know  are  contained  in  these  pages 
will  do  a  service  long  after  the  writer,  and  the  occasion  of 
their  utterance,  have  passed  off  and  been  forgot.  I  offer 
them  to  whom  they  may  concern. 

THEODORE   PARKER. 


CONTENTS. 


The  Relation  of  Jesus  to  his  Age  and  the  Ages.  A  Sermon 
preached  at  the  Thursday  Lecture,  in  Boston,  December  26, 
1844 Page  1 

II. 

The  True  Idea  of  a  Christian  Church.  A  Discourse  at  the 
Installation  of  Theodore  Parker  as  Minister  of  the  Twenty- 
Eighth  Congregational  Church  in  Boston,  on  Sunday,  Janu- 
ary 4,  1846 17 

in. 

A  Sermon  of  War.  Preached  at  the  Melodeon,  on  Sunday, 
June?,  1846.  ...  '• 46 

IV. 

•r 

A  Speech  delivered  at  the  Anti-War  Meeting  in  Fanueil 
Hall,  February  4,  1847 81 

V.    . 

A  Sermon  of  the  Mexican  War.  Preached  at  the  Melodeon, 
on  Sunday,  June  25,  1848 91 

VI. 

A  Sermon  of  the  Perishing  Classes  in  Boston.  Preached  at 
the  Melodeon  on  Sunday,  August  30,  1846.  .  .  .  133 


VI  CONTENTS. 

VII. 

A  Sermon  of  Merchants.     Preached  at  the  Melodeon,  on  Sun- 
day, November  22,  1846.  .         .         ....         .162 

VIII. 

A  Sermon  of  the  Dangerous  Classes  in  Society.     Preached  at 
the  Melodeon,  on  Sunday,  January  31,  J847.      .         .         .  200 


A  Sermon  of  Poverty.     Preached  at  the  Melodeon,  on  Sun- 
day, January  14,  1849 i         .  239 

X. 

A  Sermon  of  the  Moral  Condition  of  Boston.     Preached  at 
the  Melodeon,  on  Sunday,  February  11,  1849.    .  .  260 


A  Sermon  of  the  Spiritual  Condition  of  Boston.  Preached  at 
the  Melodeon,  on  Sunday,  February  18,  1849.  .  .  .  298 

XII. 

Some  Thoughts  on  the  Most  Christian  Use  of  the  Sunday.  A 
Sermon  preached  at  the  Melodeon,  on  Sunday,  January  30, 
1848.  .  .-.•.•. 336 

XIII. 

A  Sermon  of  Immortal  Life.  Preached  at  the  Melodeon,  on 
Sunday,  September  20,  1846.  .  -.  •'•^  ;  ..  .  .373 

•XIV. 

The  Public  Education  of  the  People.  An  Address  delivered 
before  the  Onondaga  Teachers'  Institute  at  Syracuse,  New 
York,  October  4,  1849 397 


I. 


THE  RELATION  OF  JESUS  TO  HIS  AGE  AND  THE 
AGES.  — A  SERMON  PREACHED  AT  THE  THURSDAY 
LECTURE,  IN  BOSTON,  DECEMBER  26,  1844. 


JOHN  VII.  48. 

'•  UA\L   ANY   (IK   TUB   BfLIlt*,  OK   OF    TUB    I'HARlSKKs,    BLI.ltVED    O.S    11111  ?" 

IN  all  the  world  there  is  nothing  so  remarkable  as  a  great 
man  ;  nothing  so  rare  ;  nothing  which  so  well  repays  study. 
Human  nature  is  loyal  at  its  heart,  and  is,  always  and 
everywhere,  looking  for  this  its  true  earthly  sovereign.  We 
sometimes  say  that  our  institutions,  here  in  America,  do  not 
require  great  men  ;  that  we  get  along  better  without  than 
with  such.  But  let  a  real,  great  man  light  on  our  quarter 
of  the  planet ;  let  us  understand  him,  and  straightway  these 
democratic  hearts  of  ours  burn  with  admiration  and  with 
love.  We  wave  in  his  words,  like  corn  in  the  harvest 
wind.  We  should  rejoice  to  obey  him,  for  he  would  speak 
what  we  need  to  hear.  Men  are  always  half  expecting 
such  a  man.  But  when  he  comes,  the  real,  great  man  that 
God  has  been  preparing,  —  men  are  disappointed;  they  do 
not  recognize  him.  He  does  not  enter  the  city  through  the 
gates  which  expectants  had  crowded.  He  is  a  fresh  fact, 
brand  new  ;  not  exactly  like  any  former  fact.  Therefore 
mun  do  not  recognize  nor  acknowledge  him.  His  language 
1 


RELATION    OF    JESUS 


is  strange,  and  his  form  unusual.  He  looks  revolutionary, 
and  pulls  down  ancient  walls  to  build  his  own  temple,  or,  at 
least,  splits  old  rocks  asunder,  and  quarries  anew  fresh 
granite  and  marble. 

There  are  two  classes  of  great  men.  Now  and  then 
some  arise  whom  all  acknowledge  to  be  great,  soon  as  they 
appear.  Such  men  have  what  is  true  in  relation  to  the 
wants  and  expectations  of  to-day.  They  say,  what  many 
men  wished  but  had  not  words  for ;  they  translate  into 
thought  what,  as  a  dim  sentiment,  lay  a  burning  in  many  a 
heart,  but  could  not  get  entirely  written  out  into  conscious- 
ness. These  men  find  a  welcome.  Nobody  misunderstands 
them.  The  world  follows  at  their  chariot-wheels,  and  flings 
up  its  cap  and  shouts  its  huzzas,  —  for  the  world  is  loyal, 
and  follows  its  king  when  it  sees  and  knows  him.  The 
good  part  of  the  world  follows  the  highest  man  it  compre- 
hends ;  the  bad,  whoever  serves  its  turn. 

But  there  is  another  class  of  men  so  great,  that  all  cannot 
see  their  greatness.  They  are  in  advance  of  men's  con- 
jectures, higher  than  their  dreams  ;  too  good  to  be  actual, 
think  some.  Therefore,  say  many,  there  must  be  some 
mistake  ;  this  man  is  not  so  great  as  he  seems ;  nay,  he  is 
no  great  man  at  all,  but  an  impostor.  These  men  have 
what  is  true  not  merely  in  relation  to  the  wants  and  expecta- 
tions of  men  here  and  to-day ;  but  what  is  true  in  relation 
to  the  Universe,  to  Eternity,  to  God.  They  do  not  speak 
what  you  and  I  have  been  trying  to  say,  and  cannot ;  but 
what  we  shall  one  day,  years  hence,  wish  to  say,  after  we 
have  improved  and  grown  up  to  man's  estate. 

Now  it  seems  to  me,  the  men  of  this  latter  class,  when 
they  come,  can  never  meet  the  approbation  of  the  censors 
and  guides  of  public  opinion.  Such  as  wished  for  a  new 
great  man  had  a  superstition  of  the  last  one  in  their  minds. 
They  expected  the  new  to  be  just  like  the  old,  but  he  is 
altogether  unlike.  Nature  is  rich,  but  not  rich  enough  to 
waste  any  thing.  So  there  are  never  two  great  men  very 
4k 


TO    HIS    AGE    AND    THE    AGES.  3 

strongly  similar.  Nay,  this  new  great  man,  perhaps,  begins 
by  destroying  much  that  the  old  one  built  up  with  tears  and 
prayers.  He  shows,  at  first,  the  limitations  and  defects  of 
the  former  great  man  ;  calls  in  question  his  authority.  He 
refuses  all  masters  ;  bows  not  to  tradition ;  and  with  seem- 
ing irreverence,  laughs  in  the  face  of  the  popular  idols. 
How  will  the  "  respectable  men,"  the  men  of  a  few  good 
rules  and  those  derived  from  their  fathers  "  the  best  of 
men  and  the  wisest,"  —  how  will  they  regard  this  new  great 
man  ?  They  will  see  nothing  remarkable  in  him  except 
that  he  is  fluent  and  superficial,  dangerous  and  revolu- 
tionary. He  disturbs  their  notions  of  order ;  he  shows  that 
the  institutions  of  society  are  not  perfect ;  that  their  imper- 
fections are  not  of  granite  or  marble,  but  only  of  words 
written  on  soft  wax,  which  may  be  erased  and  others  written 
thereon  anew.  He  shows  that  such  imperfect  institutions 
are  less  than  one  great  man.  The  guides  and  censors  of 
public  opinion  will  not  honor  such  a  man,  they  will  hate 
him.  Why  not  ?  Some  others,  not  half  so  well  bred,  nor 
well  furnished  with  precedents,  welcome  the  new  great 
man  ;  welcome  his  ideas  ;  welcome  his  person.  They  say, 
"  Behold  a  Prophet." 

When  Jesus,  the  son  of  Mary,  a  poor  woman,  wife  of 
Joseph,  the  carpenter,  in  the  little  town  of  Nazareth,  when 
he  "  began  to  be  about  thirty  years  old,"  and  began  also 
to  open  his  mouth  in  the  synagogues  and  the  highways, 
nobody  thought  him  a  great  man  at  all,  as  it  seems. 
"  Who  are  you  ? "  said  the  guardians  of  public  opinion. 
He  found  men  expecting  a  great  man.  This,  it  seems,  was 
the  common  opinion  that  a  great  man  was  to  arise,  and 
save  the  Church,  and  save  the  State.  They  looked  back  to 
Moses,  a  divine  man  of  antiquity,  whose  great  life  had 
passed  into  the  world,  and  to  whom  men  had  done  honor, 
in  various  ways  ;  amongst  others,  by  telling  all  sorts  of 
wonders  he  wrought,  and  declaring  that  none  could  be  so 


4  RELATION    OF    JESUS 

great  again  ;  none  get  so  near  to  God.  They  looked  back 
also  to  the  prophets,  a  long  line  of  divine  men,  so  they 
reckoned,  but  less  than  the  awful  Moses ;  his  stature  was 
far  above  the  nation,  who  hid  themselves  in  his  shadow. 
Now  the  well-instructed  children  of  Abraham  thought  the 
next  great  man  must  be  only  a  copy  of  the  last,  repeat  his 
ideas,  and  work  in  the  old  fashion.  Sick  men  like  to  be 
healed  by  the  medicine  which  helped  them  the  last  time ;  at 
least,  by  the  customary  drugs  which  are  popular. 

In  Judea  there  were  then  three  parties  of  men,  distinctly 
marked.  There  were  the  Conservatives,  —  they  repre- 
sented the  church,  tradition,  ecclesiastical  or  theocratical 
authority.  They  adhered  to  the  words  of  the  old  books, 
the  forms  of  the  old  rites,  the  tradition  of  the  elders. 
"Nobody  but  a  Jew  can  be  saved,"  said  they;  "  he  only 
by  circumcision,  and  the  keeping  of  the  old  formal  law ; 
God  likes  that,  He  accepts  nothing  else."  These  were  the 
Pharisees,  with  their  servants  the  Scribes.  Of  this  class 
were  the  Priests  and  the  Levites  in  the  main,  the  National 
party,  the  Native-Hebrew  party  of  that  time.  They  had 
tradition,  Moses  and  the  prophets ;  they  believed  in  tradi- 
tion, Moses  and  the  prophets,  at  least  in  public  ;  what  they 
believed  in  private  God  knew,  and  so  did  they.  I  know 
nothing  of  that. 

Then  there  was  the  indifferent  party;  the  Sadducees, 
the  State.  They  had  wealth,  and  they  believed  in  it,  both 
in  public  and  private  too.  They  had  a  more  generous  and 
extensive  cultivation  than  the  Pharisees.  They  had  inter- 
course with  foreigners,  and  understood  the  writers  of  Ionia 
and  Athens,  which  the  Pharisee  held  in  abhorrence.  These 
were  sleek  respectable  men,  who,  in  part,  disbelieved  the 
Jewish  theology.  It  is  no  very  great  merit  to  disbelieve 
even  in  the  devil,  unless  you  have  a  positive  faith  in  God  to 
tako  up  your  affections.  The  Sadducee  believed  neither  in 
angel  nor  resurrection —  not  at  all  in  the  immortality  of  the 
soul.  He  believed  in  the  state,  in  the  laws,  the  constables, 


TO    HIS    AGE    AND    THE     AGES.  5 

the  prisons  and  the  axe.  In  religious  matters  the  Pharisee 
had  a  positive  belief,  only  it  was  a  positive  belief  in  a  great 
mistake.  In  religious  matters,  it  seems  the  Sadducee  had 
no  positive  belief  at  all ;  not  even  in  an  error :  at  least, 
some  think  so.  His  distinctive  affirmation  was  but  a  denial. 
He  believed  what  he  saw  with  his  eyes,  touched  with  his 
fingers,  tasted  with  his  tongue.  He  never  saw,  felt,  nor 
tasted  immortal  life  ;  he  had  no  belief  therein.  There  was 
once  a  heathen  Sadducee  who  said,  "  My  right  arm  is  my 
God  ! " 

There  was  likewise  a  party  of  Gome-outers.  They 
despaired  of  the  State  and  the  Church  too,  and  turned  off 
into  the  wilderness,  "  wbere  the  wild  asses  quench  their 
thirst,"  building  up  their  organizations  free,  as  they  hoped, 
from  all  ancient  tyrannies.  The  Bible  says  nothing  directly 
of  these  men  in  its  canonical  books.  It  is  a  curious  omis- 
sion ;  but  two  Jews,  each  acquainted  with  foreign  writers, 
Josephus  and  Philo,  give  an  account  of  these.  These  were 
the  Essenes,  an  ascetic  sect,  hostile  to  marriage,  at  least, 
many  of  them,  who  lived  in  a  sort  of  association  by  them- 
selves, and  had  all  things  in  common. 

The  Pharisees  and  the  Sadducees  had  no  great  living  and 
ruling  ideas;  none  I  mean  which  represented  man,  his 
hopes,  wishes,  affections,  his  aspirations  and  power  of 
progress.  That  is  no  very  rare  case,  perhaps,  you  will 
say,  for  a  party  in  the  Church  or  the  State  to  have  no  such 
ideas,  but  they  had  not  even  a  plausible  substitute  for  such 
ideas.  They  seemed  to  have  no  faith  in  man,  in  his  divine 
nature,  his  power  of  improvement.  The  Essenes  had 
ideas;  had  a  positive  belief;  had  faith  in  man,  but  it  was 
weakened  in  a  great  measure  by  their  machinery.  They, 
like  the  Pharisee  and  the  Sadducee,  were  imprisoned  in 
their  organization,  and  probably  saw  no  good  out  of  their 
own  party  lines. 

It  is  a  plain  thing  that  no  one  of  these  three  parties 
would  accept,  acknowledge,  or  even  perceive  the  greatness 


6  RELATION    OF    JESUS 

of  Jesus  of  Nazareth.  His  ideas  were  not  their  notions. 
He  was  not  the  man  they  were  looking  for ;  not  at  all  the 
Messiah,  the  anointed  one  of  God,  which  they  wanted. 
The  Sadducee  expected  no  new  great  man  unless  it  was  a 
Roman  quaestor,  or  procurator ;  the  Pharisees  looked  for  a 
Pharisee  stricter  than  Gamaliel ;  the  Essenes  for  an  Ascetic. 
It  is  so  now.  Some  seem  to  think  that  if  Jesus  were  to 
come  back  to  the  earth,  he  would  preach  Unitarian  sermons, 
from  a  text  out  of  the  Bible,  and  prove  his  divine  mission 
and  the  everlasting  truths,  the  truths  of  necessity  that  he 
taught,  in  the  Unitarian  way,  by  telling  of  the  miracles  he 
wrought  eighteen  hundred  years  ago ;  that  he  would  prove 
the  immortality  of  the  soul  by  the  fact  of  his  own  corporeal 
resurrection.  Others  seem  to  think  that  he  would  deliver 
homilies  of  a  severer  character ;  would  rate  men  roundly 
about  total  depravity,  and  tell  of  unconditional  election, 
salvation  without  works,  and  imputed  righteousness,  and 
talk  of  hell  till  the  women  and  children  fainted,  and  the 
knees  of  men  smote  together  for  trembling.  Perhaps  both 
would  be  mistaken. 

So  it  was  then.  All  these  three  classes  of  men,  impris- 
oned in  their  prejudices  and  superstitions,  were  hostile. 
The  Pharisees  said,  "  We  know  that  God  spake  unto 
Moses ;  but  as  for  this  fellow,  we  know  not  whence  he  is. 
lie  blasphemeth  Moses  and  the  prophets ;  yea,  he  hath  a 
devil,  and  is  mad,  why  hear  him  ?  "  The  Sadducees  com- 
plained that  "  he  stirred  up  the  people  ;  "  so  he  did.  The 
Essenes,  no  doubt,  would  have  it  that  he  was  "  a  gluttonous 
man  and  a  wine-bibber,  a  friend  of  publicans  and  sinners." 
Tried  by  these  three  standards,  the  judgment  was  true  ; 
what  could  he  do  to  please  these  three  parties  ?  Nothing  ! 
nothing  that  he  would  do.  So  they  hated  him  ;  all  hated 
him,  and  sought  to  destroy  him.  The  cause  is  plain.  He 
was  so  deep  they  could  not  see  his  profoundness ;  too  high 
for  .their  comprehension ;  too  far  before  them  for  their 
sympathy.  He  was  not  the  great  man  of  the  day.  He 


TO    HIS    AGE    AND    THE    AGES.  7 

found  all  organizations  against  him ;  Church  and  State. 
Even  John  the  Baptist,  a  real  prophet,  but  not  the  prophet, 
doubted  if  Jesus  was  the  one  to  be  followed.  If  Jesus  had 
spoken  for  the  Pharisees,  they  would  have  accepted  his 
speech  and  the  speaker  too.  Had  he  favored  the  Saddu- 
cees,  he  had  been  a  great  man  in  their  camp,  and  Herod 
would  gladly  have  poured  wine  for  the  eloquent  Galilean, 
and  have  satisfied  the  carpenter's  son  with  purple  and  fine 
linen.  Had  he, praised  the  Essenes,  uttering  their  Shibbo- 
leth, they  also  would  have  paid  him  his  price,  have  made 
him  the  head  of  their  association  perhaps,  at  least,  have 
honored  him  in  their  way.  He  spoke  for  none  of  these. 
Why  should  they  honor  or  even  tolerate  him  ?  It  were 
strange  had  they  done  so.  Was  it  through  any  fault  or 
deficiency  of  Jesus  that  these  men  refused  him  ?  quite  the 
reverse.  The  rain  falls  and  the  sun  shines  on  the  evil  and 
the  good  ;  the  work  of  infinite  power,  wisdom  and  goodness 
is  before  all  men,  revealing  the  invisible  things,  yet  the  fool 
hath  said,  ay,  said  in  his  heart,  "  There  is  no  God  !  " 

Jesus  spoke  not  for  the  prejudices  of  such,  and  therefore 
they  rejected  him.  But  as  he  spoke  truths  for  man,  truths 
from  God,  truths  adapted  to  man's  condition  there,  to  man's 
condition  everywhere  and  always,  when  the  Pharisees,  the 
Sadducees,  the  Essenes  went  away,  their  lips  curling  with 
scorn  ;  when  they  gnashed  on  one  another  witli  their  teeth, 
there  were  noble  men  and  humble  women,  who  had  long 
awaited  the  consolation  of  Israel,  and  they  heard  him,  heard 
him  gladly.  Yes,  they  left  all  to  follow  him.  Him  !  no,  it 
was  not  him  they  followed  ;  it  was  God  in  him  they  obeyed, 
the  God  of  truth,  the  God  of  love. 

There  were  men  not  counted  in  the  organized  sects ; 
men  weary  of  absurdities ;  thirsting  for  the  truth  ;  sick, 
they  knew  not  why  nor  of  what,  yet  none  the  less  sick,  and 
waiting  for  the  angel  who  should  heal  them,  though  by 
troubled  waters  and  remedies  unknown.  These  men  had 
not  the  prejudices  of  a  straightly  organized  and  narrow 


8  RELATION    OF    JESUS 

sect.  Perhaps  they  had  not  its  knowledge,  or  its  good 
manners.  They  were  "  unlearned  and  ignorant  men," 
those  early  followers  of  Christ.  Nay,  Jesus  himself  had 
no  extraordinary  culture,  as  the  world  judges  of  such 
things.  His  townsmen  wondered,  on  a  famous  occasion, 
how  he  had  learned  to  read.  He  knew  little  of  theologies, 
it  would  seem  ;  the  better  for  him,  perhaps.  No  doubt  the 
better  for  us  that  he  insisted  on  none.  He  knew  they  were 
not  religion.  The  men  of  Galilee  did  not  need  theology. 
The  youngest  scribe  in  the  humblest  theological  school  at 
Jerusalem,  if  such  a  thing  were  in  those  days,  could  have 
furnished  theology  enough  to  believe  in  a  life-time.  They 
did  need  religion  ;  they  did  see  it  as  Jesus  unfolded  its 
loveliness ;  they  did  welcome  it  when  they  saw ;  welcome 
it  in  their  hearts. 

If  I  were  a  poet  as  some  are  born,  and  skilled  to  paint 
with  words  what  shall  stand  out  as  real,  to  live  before  the 
eye,  and  then  dwell  in  the  affectionate  memory  for  ever,  I 
would  tell  of  the  audience  which  heard  the  Sermon  on  the 
mount,  which  listened  to  the  parables,  the  rebukes,  the 
beautiful  beatitudes.  They  were  plain  men,  and  humble 
women  ;  many  of  them  foolish  like  you  and  me  ;  some  of 
them  sinners.  But  they  all  had  hearts ;  had  souls,  all  of 
them  —  hearts  made  to  love,  souls  expectant  of  truth. 
When  he  spoke,  some  said,  no  doubt,  "That  is  a  new  thing, 
that  The  true  worshipper  shall  worship  in  spirit  and  in  truth, 
as  well  here  as  in  Jerusalem,  now  as  well  as  any  time  ;  that 
also  is  a  hard  saying,  Love  your  enemies ;  forgive  them, 
though  seventy  times  seven  they  smite  and  offend  you  ; 
that  notion  that  the  law  and  the  prophets  are  contained,  all 
that  is  essentially  religious  thereof,  in  one  precept,  Love 
men  as  yourself,  and  God  with  all  your  might.  This  differs 
a  good  deal  from  the  Pharisaic  orthodoxy  of  the  synagogue. 
That  is  a  bold  thing,  presumptuous  and  revolutionary  to  say, 
I  am  greater  than  the  temple,  wiser  than  Solomon,  a  better 
symbol  of  God  than  both."  But  there  was  something 


TO    HIS    AGE    AND    THE    AGES.  U 

deeper  than  Jewish  orthodoxy  in  their  hearts ;  something 
that  Jewish  orthodoxy  could  not  satisfy,  and  what  was  yet 
more  troublesome  to  ecclesiastical  guides,  something  that 
Jewish  orthodoxy  could  not  keep  down,  nor  even  cover  up. 
Sinners  were  converted  at  his  reproof.  They  felt  he 
rebuked  whom  he  loved.  Yet  his  pictures  of  sin  and 
sinners  too,  were  anything  but  flattering.  There  was  small 
comfort  in  them.  Still  it  was  not  the  publicans  and  harlots 
who  laid  their  hands  on  the  place  where  their  hearts  should 
be,  saying,  "  You  hurt  our  feelings,"  and  "  we  can't  bear 
you  !  "  Nay,  they  pondered  his  words,  repenting  in  tears. 
He  showed  them  their  sin ;  its  cause,  its  consequence,  its 
cure.  To  them  he  came  as  a  Saviour,  and  they  said, 
"  Thou  art  well-come,"  those  penitent  Magdalens  weeping 
at  his  feet. 

It  would  be  curious  could  we  know  the  mingled  emotions 
that  swayed  the  crowd  which  rolled  up  around  Jesus, 
following  him,  as  the  tides  obey  the  moon,  wherever  he 
went ;  curious  to  see  how  faces  looked  doubtful  at  first  as 
he  began  to  speak  at  Tabor  or  Gennesareth,  Capernaum  or 
Gischala,  then  how  the  countenance  of  some  lowered  and 
grew  black  with  thunder  suppressed  but  cherished,  while 
the  face  of  others  shone  as  a  branch  of  stars  seen  through 
some  disparted  cloud  in  a  night  of  fitful  storms,  a  moment 
seen  and  then  withdrawn.  It  were  curious  to  see  how 
gradually  many  discordant  feelings,  passion,  prejudice  and 
pride  were  hushed  before  the  tide  of  melodious  religion  he 
poured  out  around  him,  baptizing  anew  saint  and  sinner, 
and  old  and  young,  into  one  brotherhood  of  a  common  soul, 
into  one  immortal  service  of  the  universal  God  ;  to  see  how 
this  young  Hebrew  maid,  deep-hearted,  sensitive,  enthusi- 
astic, self-renouncing,  intuitive  of  heavenly  truth,  rich  as  a 
young  vine,  with  clustering  affections  just  purpling  into 
ripeness,  —  how  she  seized,  first  and  all  at  once,  the  fair 
ideal,  and  with  generous  bosom  confidingly  embraced  it 
too  ;  how  that  old  man,  gray-bearded,  with  baldness  on  his 


10  RELATION    OF    JESUS 

head,  full  of  precepts  and  precedents,  the  lore  of  his 
fathers,  the  experience  of  a  hard  life,  logical,  slow,  cal- 
culating, distrustful,  remembering  much  and  fearing  much, 
but  hoping  little,  confiding  only  in  the  fixed,  his  reverence 
for  the  old  deepening  as  he  himself  became  of  less  use, — 
to  see  how  he  received  the  glad  inspirations  of  the  joiner's 
son,  and  wondering  felt  his  youth  steal  slowly  back  upon 
his  heart,  reviving  aspirations,  long  ago  forgot,  and  then  the 
crimson  tide  of  early  hope  come  gushing,  tingling  on 
through  every  limb ;  to  see  how  the  young  man  halting 
between  principle  and  passion,  not  yet  petrified  into  worldli- 
ness,  but  struggling,  uncertain,  half  reluctant,  with  those 
two  serpents,  Custom  and  Desire,  that  beautifully  twined 
about  his  arms  and  breast  and  neck,  their  wormy  folds, 
concealing  underneath  their  burnished  scales  the  dragon's 
awful  strength,  the  viper's  poison  fang,  the  poor  youth 
caressing  their  snaky  crests,  and  toying  with  their  tongues 
of  flame  —  to  see  how  he  slowly,  reluctantly,  amid  great 
questionings  of  heart,  drank  in  the  words  of  truth,  and 
then,  obedient  to  the  angel  in  his  heart,  shook  ofF,  as  ropes 
of  sand,  that  hideous  coil  and  trod  the  serpents  underneath 
his  feet.  All  this,  it  were  curious,  ay,  instructive  too  could 
we  but  see. 

They  heard  him  with  welcome  various  as  their  life.  The 
old  man  said,  "  It  is  Moses  or  Elias  ;  it  is  Jeremiah,  one  of 
the  old  prophets  arisen  from  the  dead,  for  God  makes  none 
such,  now-a-days,  in  the  sterile  dotage  of  mankind."  The 
young  men  and  maidens  doubtless  it  was  that  said,  "  This  is 
the  Christ ;  the  desire  of  the  nations  ;  the  hope  of  the  world, 
the  great  new  prophet ;  the  Son  of  David  ;  the  Son  of  Man  ; 
yes,  the  Son  of  God.  He  shall  be  our  king."  Human 
nature  is  loyal,  and  follows  its  king  soon  as  it  knows  him. 
Poor  lost  sheep !  the  children  of  men  look  always  for  their 
guide,  though  so  often  they  look  in  vain. 

How  he  spoke,  words  deep  and  piercing  ;  rebukes  for 
the  wicked,  doubly  rebuking,  because  felt  to  have  come  out 


TO    HIS    AGE    AND    THE    AGES.  11 

from  a  great,  deep,  loving  heart.  His  first  word  was, 
perhaps,  "  Repent,"  but  with  the  assurance  that  the  king- 
dom of  God  was  here  and  now,  within  reach  of  all.  How 
his  doctrines,  those  great  truths  of  nature,  commended 
themselves  to  the  heart  of  each,  of  all  simple-souled  men 
looking  for  the  truth  !  He  spoke  out  of  his  experience  ;  of 
course  into  theirs.  He  spoke  great  doctrines,  truths  vast  as 
the  soul,  eternal  as  God,  winged  with  beauty  from  the 
loveliness  of  his  own  life.  Had  he  spoken  for  the  Jews 
alone,  his  words  had  perished  with  that  people ;  for  that 
time  barely,  the  echo  of  his  name  had  died  away  in  his 
native  hamlet ;  for  the  Pharisees,  the  Sadducees,  the 
Essenes,  you  and  I  had  heard  of  him  but  as  a  Rabbi ;  nay, 
had  never  been  blest  by  him  at  all.  Words  for  a  nation, 
an  age,  a  sect,  are  of  use  in  their  place,  yet  they  soon 
come  to  nought.  But  as  he  spoke  for  eternity,  his  truths 
ride  on  the  wings  of  time  ;  as  he  spoke  for  man,  they  are 
welcome,  beautiful  and  blessing,  wherever  man  is  found, 
and  so  must  be  till  man  and  time  shall  cease. 

He  looked  not  back,  as  the  Pharisee,  save  for  illustra- 
tions and  examples.  He  looked  forward  for  his  direction. 
He  looked  around  for  his  work.  There  it  lay,  the  harvest 
plenteous,  the  laborers  few.  It  is  always  so.  He  looked 
not  to  men  for  his  idea,  his  word  to  speak  ;  as  little  for  their 
applause.  He  looked  in,  to  God,  for  guidance,  wisdom, 
strength,  and  as  water  in  the  wilderness,  at  the  stroke  of 
Moses,  in  the  Hebrew  legend,  so  inspiration  came  at  his 
call,  a  mighty  stream  of  truth  for  the  nation,  faint,  feeble, 
afraid,  and  wandering  for  the  promised  land ;  drink  for  the 
thirsty,  and  cleansing  for  the  unclean. 

But  he  met  opposition  ;  O,  yes,  enough  of  it.  How  could 
it  be  otherwise  ?  It  must  be  so.  The  very  soul  of  peace, 
he  brought  a  sword.  His  word  was  a  consuming  fire.  The 
Pharisees  wanted  to  be  applauded,  commended  ;  to  have 
their  sect,  their  plans,  their  traditions  praised  and  flattered. 
His  word  to  them  was,  "  Repent ;  "  of  them,  to  the  people, 


12  RELATION    OF    JESUS 

"  Such  righteousness  admits  no  man  to  the  kingdom  of 
heaven ;  they  are  a  deceitful  prophecy,  blind  guides, 
hypocrites ;  not  sons  of  Abraham,  but  children  of  the 
devil."  They  could  not  bear  him ;  no  wonder  at  it.  He 
was  the  aggressor ;  had  carried  the  war  into  the  very  heart 
of  their  system.  They  turned  out  of  their  company  a  man 
whose  blindness  he  healed,  because  he  confessed  that  fact. 
They  made  a  law  that  all  who  believed  on  him,  should  also 
be  cast  out.  Well  they  might  hate  him,  those  old  Pharisees. 
His  existence  was  their  reproach  ;  his  preaching  their  trial ; 
his  life  with  its  outward  goodness,  its  piety  within,  was  their 
condemnation.  The  man  was  their  ruin,  and  they  knew  it. 
The  cunning  can  see  their  own  danger,  but  it  is  only  men 
wise  in  mind,  or  men  simple  of  heart,  that  can  see  their 
real,  permanent  safety  and  defence  ;  never  the  cunning, 
neither  then,  neither  now. 

Jesus  looked  to  God  for  his  truth,  his  great  doctrines  not 
his  own,  private,  personal,  depending  on  his  idiosyncracies, 
and  therefore  only  subjectively  true,  —  but  God's,  universal, 
everlasting,  the  absolute  religion.  I  do  not  know  that  he 
did  not  teach  some  errors  also,  along  with  it.  I  care  not  if 
he  did.  It  is  by  his  truths  that  I  know  him,  the  absolute 
religion  he  taught  and  lived  ;  by  his  highest  sentiments  that 
he  is  to  be  appreciated.  He  had  faith  in  God  and  obeyed 
God  ;  hence  his  inspiration,  great,  in  proportion  to  the 
greater  endowment,  moral  and  religious,  which  God  gave 
him,  great  likewise  in  proportion  to  his  perfect  obedience. 
He  had  faith  in  man  none  the  less.  Whoever  yet  had  faith 
in  God  that  had  none  in  man  ?  I  know  not.  Surely  no 
inspired  prophet.  As  Jesus  had  faith  in  man,  so  he  spoke 
to  men.  Never  yet,  in  the  wide  world,  did  a  prophet  arise, 
appealing  with  a  noble  heart  and  a  noble  life  to  the  soul  of 
goodness  in  man,  but  that  soul  answered  to  the  call'.  It  was 
so  most  eminently  with  Jesus.  The  Scribes  and  Pharisees 
could  not  understand  by  what  authority  he  taught.  Poor 
Pharisees !  how  could  they  ?  His  phylacteries  were  no 


TO    HIS    AGE    AND    THE    AGES.  13 

broader  than  those  of  another  man  ;  nay,  perhaps  he  had 
no  phylacteries  at  all,  nor  even  a  broad-bordered  garment. 
Men  did  not  salute  him  in  the  market-place,  sandals  in 
hand,  with  their  "Rabbi!  Rabbi!"  Could  such  men 
understand  by  what  authority  he  taught  ?  no  more  than 
they  dared  answer  his  questions.  They  that  knew  him, 
felt  he  had  authority  quite  other  than  that  claimed  by  the 
Scribes  ;  the  authority  of  true  words,  the  authority  of  a 
noble  life  ;  yes,  the  authority  which  God  gives  a  great 
moral  and  religious  man.  God  delegates  authority  to  men 
just  in  proportion  to  their  power  of  truth,  and  their  power 
of  goodness  ;  to  their  being  and  their  life.  So  God  spoke 
in  Jesus,  as  he  taught  the  perfect  religion,  anticipated, 
developed,  but  never  yet  transcended. 

This  then  was  the  relation  of  Jesus  to  his  age :  the  secta- 
rians cursed  him  ;  cursed  him  by  their  gods ;  rejected  him, 
abused  him,  persecuted  him ;  sought  his  life.  Yes,  they 
condemned  him  in  the  name  of  God.  All  evil,  says  the 
proverb,  begins  in  that  name  ;  much  continues  to  claim  it. 
The  religionists,  the  sects,  the  sectarian  leaders  rejected 
him,  condemned  and  slew  him  at  the  last,  hanging  his  body 
on  a  tree.  Poor  priests  of  the  people,  they  hoped  thereby 
to  stifle  that  awful  soul !  they  only  stilled  the  body ;  that 
soul  spoke  with  a  thousand  tongues.  So  in  the  times  of  old 
when  the  Saturnian  day  began  to  dawn,  it  might  be  fabled 
that  the  old  Titanic  race,  lovers  of  darkness  and  haters  of 
the  light,  essayed  to  bar  the  rising  morning  from  the  world, 
and  so  heaped  Pelion  upon  Ossa,  and  Olympus  on  Pelion ; 
but  first  the  day  sent  up  his  crimson  flush  upon  the  cloud, 
and  then  his  saffron  tinge,  and  next  the  sun  came  peering 
o'er  the  loftiest  height,  magnificently  fair  —  and  down  the 
mountain's  slanting  ridge  poured  the  intolerable  day ;  mean- 
while those  triple  hills,  laboriously  piled,  came  toppling, 
tumbling  down,  with  lumbering  crush,  and  underneath  their 
ruin  hid  the  helpless  giants'  grave.  So  was  it  with  men 
2 


14  RELATION    OF    JESUS 

who  sat  in  Moses'  seat.  But  this  people,  that  "  knew  not  the 
Law,"  and  were  counted  therefore  accursed,  they  welcomed 
Jesus  as  they  never  welcomed  the  Pharisee,  the  Sadducee  or 
the  Scribe.  Ay,  hence  were  their  tears.  The  hierarchical 
fire  burnt  not  so  bright  contrasted  with  the  sun.  That  peo- 
ple had  a  Simon  Peter,  a  James  and  a  John,  men  not  free 
from  faults  no  doubt,  the  record  shows  it,  but  with  hearts  in 
their  bosoms,  which  could  be  kindled,  and  then  could  light 
other  hearts.  Better  still,  there  were  Marthas  and  Marys 
among  that  people  who  "knew  not  the  law"  and  were 
cursed.  They  were  the  mothers  of  many  a  church. 

The  character  of  Jesus  has  not  changed  ;  his  doctrines 
are  still  the  same  ;  but  what  a  change  in  his  relation  to  the 
age,  nay  to  the  ages.  The  stone  that  the  builders  rejected 
is  indeed  become  the  head  of  the  corner,  and  its  foundation 
too.  He  is  worshiped  as  a  God.  That  is  the  rank  assigned 
him  by  all  but  a  fraction  of  the  Christian  world.  It  is  no 
wonder.  Good  men  worship  the  best  thing  they  know,  and 
call  it  God.  What  was  taught  to  the  mass  of  men,  in  those 
days,  better  than  the  character  of  Christ?  Should  they 
rather  worship  the  Grecian  Jove,  or  the  Jehovah  of  the 
Jews  ?  To  me  it  seems  the  moral  attainment  of  Jesus  was 
above  the  hierarchical  conception  of  God,  as  taught  at 
Athens,  Rome,  Jerusalem.  Jesus  was  the  prince  of  peace, 
the  king  of  truth,  praying  for  his  enemies  —  "  Father  for- 
give them,  for  they  know  not  what  they  do  !  "  The  Jehovah 
of  the  Old  Testament,  was  awful  and  stern,  a  man  of  war, 
hating  the  wicked.  The  sacerdotal  conception  of  God  at 
Rome  and  Athens  was  lower  yet.  No  wonder  then,  that 
men  soon  learned  to  honor  Jesus  as  a  God,  and  then  as  God 
himself.  Apostolical  and  other  legends  tell  of  his  divine 
birth,  his  wondrous  power  that  healed  the  sick,  palsied  and 
crippled,  deaf  and  dumb  and  blind  ;  created  bread  ;  turned 
water  into  wine,  and  bid  obedient  devils  come  and  go,  a 
power  that  raised  the  dead.  They  tell  that  nature  felt  with 


TO    HIS    AGE    AND    THE    AGES.  15 

him,  and  at  his  death  the  strongly  sympathizing  sun  paused 
at  high  noon,  and  for  three  hours  withheld   the  day ;  that 
rocks  were  rent,  and  opening  graves  gave  up  their  sainted 
dead,  who  trod  once  more  the  streets  of  Zion,  the  first  fruits  \ 
of  them  that  slept ;  they  tell  too  how  disappointed  Death 
gave  back  his  prey,  and  spirit-like,  Jesus  restored,  in  flesh   1 
and  shape  the  same,  passed  through  the  doors  shut  up,  and 
in  a  bodily  form  was  taken  up  to  heaven  before  the  face  of 
men !     Believe  men  of  these  things  as  they  will.     To  me   ! 
they  are  not  truth  and  fact,  but  mythic  symbols  and  poetry  ; 
the  psalm  of  praise  with  which  the  world's  rude  heart  extols 
and  magnifies  its  King.     It  is  for  his  truth  and  his  life,  his  , 
wisdom,  goodness,  piety,  that  he  is  honored  in  my  heart ; 
yes,  in  the  world's  heart.     It  is  for  this  that  in  his  name 
churches  are  built,  and  prayers  are  prayed  ;  for  this  that 
the  best  things  we  know,  we  honor  with  his  name. 

He  is  the  greatest  person  of  the  ages ;  the  proudest 
achievement  of  the  human  race.  He  taught  the  absolute 
religion,  love  to  God  and  man.  That  God  has  yet  greater 
men  in  store  I  doubt  not ;  to  say  this  is  not  to  detract  from 
the  majestic  character  of  Christ,  but  to  affirm  the  omnipo- 
tence of  God.  When  they  come,  the  old  contest  will  be 
renewed,  the  living  Prophet  stoned ;  the  dead  one  wor- 
shipped. Be  that  as  it  may,  there  are  duties  he  teaches  us 
far  different  from  those  most  commonly  taught.  He  was 
the  greatest  fact  in  the  whole  history  of  man.  Had  he  con- 
formed to  what  was  told  him  of  men ;  had  he  counselled 
only  with  flesh  and  blood ;  he  had  been  nothing  but  a  poor 
Jew  —  the  world  had  lost  that  rich  endowment  of  religious 
genius,  that  richest  treasure  of  religious  life,  the  glad 
tidings  of  the  one  religion,  absolute  and  true  What  if 
he  had  said,  as  others,  "  None  can  be  greater  than  Moses, 
none  so  great  ?  "  He  had  been  a  dwarf ;  the  spirit  of  God 
had  faded  from  his  soul !  But  he  conferred  with  God,  not 
men ;  took  counsel  of  his  hopes,  not  his  fears.  Working 
for  men,  with  men,  by  men,  trusting  in  God,  and  pure  as 


Hi  RELATION    OF    JESUS  TO    HIS    AfiK. 

truth,  he  was  not  scared  at  the  little  din  of  church  or  state, 
and  trembled  not,  though  Pilate  and  Herod  were  made 
friends  only  to  crucify  him  that  was  a  born  King  of  the 
world.  Methinks  I  hear  that  lofty  spirit  say  to  you  or  me, 
poor  brother,  fear  not,  nor  despair.  The  goodness  actual  in 
me  is  possible  for  all.  God  is  near  thee  now  as  then  to  me ; 
rich  as  ever  in  truth,  as  able  to  create,  as  willing  to  inspire. 
Daily  and  nightly  He  showers  down  his  infinitude  of  light. 
Open  thine  eyes  to  see,  thy  heart  to  live.  Lo,  God  is  here. 


II. 


THE  TRUE  IDEA  OF  A  CHRISTIAN  CHURCH.  —  A  DISCOURSE  AT  THE 
INSTALLATION  OF  THEODORE  PARKER  AS  MINISTER  OF  THE 
TWENTY-EIGHTH  CONGREGATIONAL  CHURCH  IN  BOSTON,  JANUARY 
4,  1846. 


FOR  nearly  a  year  we  have  assembled  within  these  walls 
from  week  to  week,  —  1  think  not  idly ;  I  know  you  have 
not  come  for  any  trivial  end.  You  have  recently  made  a 
formal  organization  of  yourselves  for  religious  action.  To- 
day, at  your  request,  I  enter  regularly  on  a  ministry  in  the 
midst  of  you.  What  are  we  doing ;  what  do  we  design  to 
do  ?  We  are  here  to  establish  a  Christian  church  ;  and  a 
Christian  church,  as  1  understand  it,  is  a  body  of  men  and 
women  united  together  in  a  common  desire  of  religious 
excellence  and  with  a  common  regard  for  Jesus  of  Naza- 
reth, regarding  him  as  the  noblest  example  of  morality  and 
religion,  —  as  the  model,  therefore,  in  this  respect  for  us. 
Such  a  church  may  have  many  rites,  as  our  Catholic 
brothers,  or  but  few  rites,  as  our  Protestant  brothers,  or  no 
rites  at  all,  as  our  brothers,  the  Friends.  It  may  be,  never- 
theless, a  Christian  church  ;  for  the  essential  of  substance, 
which  makes  it  a  religious  body,  is  the  union  for  the  pur- 
pose of  cultivating  love  to  God  and  man  ;  and  the  essential 
of  form,  which  makes  it  a  Christian  body,  is  the  common 
regard  for  Jesus,  considered  as  the  highest  representative  of 
God  that  we  know.  It  is  not  the  form,  either  of  ritual  or 
of  doctrine,  but  the  spirit  which  constitutes  a  Christian 
church.  A  staff  may  sustain  an  old  man,  or  a  young  man 
2* 


18  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

may  bear  it  in  his  hands  as  a  toy,  but  walking  is  walking, 
though  the  man  have  no  staff  for  ornament  or  support.  A 
Christian  spirit  may  exist  under  rituals  and  doctrines  the 
most  diverse.  It  were  hard  to  say  a  man  is  not  a  Christian, 
because  he  believes  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  or  the 
Pope,  while  Jesus  taught  no  such  doctrine  ;  foolish  to  say 
one  is  no  Christian  because  he  denies  the  existence  of  a 
Devil,  though  Jesus  believed  it.  To  make  a  man's  Chris- 
tian name  depend  on  a  belief  of  all  that  is  related  by  the 
numerous  writers  in  the  Bible,  is  as  absurd  as  to  make  that 
depend  on  a  belief  in  all  the  words  of  Luther,  or  Calvin,  or 
St.  Augustine.  It  is  not  for  me  to  say  a  man  is  not  theoret- 
ically a  Christian  because  he  believes  that  Slavery  is  a 
Divine  and  Christian  institution  ;  that  War  is  grateful  to 
God  —  saying,  with  the  Old  Testament,  that  God  himself 
"  is  a  man  of  war,"  who  teaches  men  to  fight,  and  curses 
such  as  refuse  ;  —  or  because  he  believes  that  all  men  are 
born  totally  depraved,  and  the  greater  part  of  them  are  to 
be  damned  everlastingly  by  "  a  jealous  God,"  who  is 
"  angry  with  the  wicked  every  day,"  and  that  the  few  are 
to  be  "  saved "  only  because  God  unjustly  punished  an 
innocent  man  for  their  sake.  I  will  not  say  a  man  is  not  a 
Christian  though  he  believe  all  the  melancholy  things 
related  of  God  in  some  parts  of  the  Old  Testament,  yet  I 
know  few  doctrines  so  hostile  to  real  religion  as  these  have 
proved  themselves.  In  our  day  it  has  strangely  come  to 
pass  that  a  little  sect,  themselves  hooted  at  and  called 
"  Infidels "  by  the  rest  of  Christendom,  deny  the  name  of 
Christian  to  such  as  publicly  reject  the  miracles  of  the 
Bible.  Time  will  doubtless  correct  this  error.  Fire  is  fire, 
and  ashes  ashes,  say  what  we  may ;  each  will  work  after  its 
kind.  Now  if  Christianity  be  the  absolute  religion,  it  must 
allow  all  beliefs  that  are  true,  and  it  may  exist  and  be 
developed  in  connection  with  all  forms  consistent  with 
the  absolute  religion,  and  the  degree  thereof  represented 
by  Jesus. 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  19 

The  action  of  a  Christian  church  seems  to  be  two-fold  : 
first  on  its  own  members,  and  then,  through  their  means,  on 
others  out  of  its  pale.     Let  a  word  be  said  of  each  in  its . 
order.     If  I  were  to  ask  you  why  you  came  here  to-day ; 
why  you   have  often   come   to  this  house   hitherto  ?  —  the 
serious  amongst  you  would  say  :   That  we   might  become 
better ;    more  manly ;    upright  before  God  and  downright 
before  men ;   that  we  might  be  Christians,  men  good  and 
pious  after  the  fashion  Jesus  spoke  of.     The  first  design  of 
such  a  church  then  is  to  help  ourselves  become  Christians. 
Now  the  substance  of  Christianity  is  Piety  —  Love  to  God, 
and  Goodness  —  Love  to  men.     It  is  a  religion,  the  germs 
whereof  are  born  in  your  heart,  appearing  in  your  earliest 
childhood  ;  which  are  developed  just  in  proportion  as  you 
become  a  man,  and   are  indeed  the  standard  measure  of 
your  life.     As  the  primeval  rock  lies  at  the  bottom  of  the 
sea  and  appears  at  the  top  of  the  loftiest  mountains,  so  in  a 
finished  character  religion   underlies  all   and   crowns   all. 
Christianity,  to  be  perfect  and  entire,  demands  a  complete 
manliness  ;  the  development  of  the  whole  man,  mind,  con- 
science, heart  and  soul.     It  aims  not  to  destroy  the  sacred 
peculiarities   of    individual   character.      It    cherishes    and 
develops  them  in  their  perfection,  leaving  Paul  to  be  Paul, 
not  Peter,  and  John  to  be  John,  not  Jude  nor  James.     We 
are   born   different,  into  a  world   where  unlike  things  are 
gathered  together,  that  there   may  be  a  special  work   for 
each.     Christianity  respects  this  diversity  in    men,  aiming 
not  to  undo  but  further  God's  will ;  not  fashioning  all  men 
after  one  pattern,  to  think  alike,  act  alike,  be  alike,  even 
look   alike.     It   is   something   far  other   than   Christianity 
which  demands  that.     A  Christian  church  then  should  put 
no  fetters  on  the  man  ;  it  should  have  unity  of  purpose,  but 
with  the  most  entire  freedom  for  the  individual.    When  you 
sacrifice  the  man  to  the  mass  in  church  or  state,  church  or 
state  becomes  an  offence,  a  stumbling-block  in  the  way  of 
progress,  and  must  end  or  mend.     The  greater  the  variety 


20  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

of  individualities  in  church  or  state,  the  better  is  it,  so  long 
as  all  are  really  manly,  humane  and  accordant.  A  church 
must  needs  be  partial,  not  catholic,  where  all  men  think 
alike,  narrow  and  little.  Your  church-organ,  to  have  com- 
pass and  volume,  must  have  pipes  of  various  sound,  and 
the  skilful  artist  destroys  none,  but  tunes  them  all  to 
harmony ;  if  otherwise,  he  does  not  understand  his  work. 
In  becoming  Christians  let  us  not  cease  to  be  men ; 
nay,  we  cannot  be  Christians  unless  we  are  men  first.  It 
were  unchristian  to  love  Christianity  better  than  the  truth, 
or  Christ  better  than  man. 

But  Christianity  is  not  only  the  absolute  religion ;  it  has 
also  the  ideal-man.  In  Jesus  of  Nazareth  it  gives  us,  in  a 
certain  sense,  the  model  of  religious  excellence.  It  is  a 
great  thing  to  have  the  perfect  idea  of  religion  ;  to  have  also 
that  idea  made  real,  satisfactory  to  the  wants  of  any  age, 
were  a  yet  further  greatness.  A  Christian  church  should 
aim  to  have  its  members  Christians  as  Jesus  was  the  Christ ; 
sons  of  man  as  he  was ;  sons  of  God  as  much  as  he.  To 
be  that  it  is  not  needful  to  observe  all  the  forms  he  complied 
with,  only  such  forms  as  help  you ;  not  needful  to  have  all 
the  thoughts  that  he  had,  only  such  thoughts  as  are  true.  If 
Jesus  were  ever  mistaken,  as  the  Evangelists  make  it 
appear,  then  it  is  a  part  of  Christianity  to  avoid  his  mistakes 
as  well  as  to  accept  his  truths.  It  is  the  part  of  a  Christian 
church  to  teach  men  so  ;  to  stop  at  no  man's  limitations  ; 
to  prize  no  word  so  high  as  truth  ;  no  man  so  dear  as  God. 
Jesus  came  not  to  fetter  men,  but  free  them. 

Jesus  is  a  model-man  in  this  respect :  that  he  stands  in  a 
true  relation  to  men,  that  of  forgiveness  for  their  ill-treat- 
ment, service  for  their  needs,  trust  in  their  nature,  and 
constant  love  towards  them,  —  towards  even  the  wicked  and 
hypocritical ;  in  a  true  relation  to  God,  that  of  entire 
obedience  to  Him,  of  perfect  trust  in  Him,  of  love  towards 
Him  with  the  whole  mind,  heart  and  soul  ;  and  love  of 
God  is  also  love  of  truth,  goodness,  usefulness,  love  of 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  21 

Love  itself.  Obedience  to  God  and  trust  in  God  is  obedi- 
ence to  these  tilings,  and  trust  in  them.  If  Jesus  had  loved 
any  opinion  better  than  truth,  then  had  he  lost  that  relation 
to  God,  and  so  far  ceased  to  be  inspired  by  Him ;  had  he 
allowed  any  partial  feeling  to  overcome  the  spirit  of  univer- 
sal love,  then  also  he  had  sundered  himself  from  God,  and 
been  at  discord  not  in  harmony  with  the  Infinite. 

If  Jesus  be  the  model-man,  then  should  a  Christian 
church  teach  its  members  to  hold  the  same  relation  to  God 
that  Christ  held  ;  to  be  one  with  Him ;  incarnations  of 
God,  as  much  and  as  far  as  Jesus  was  one  with  God,  and  an 
incarnation  thereof,  a  manifestation  of  God  in  the  flesh.  It 
is  Christian  to  receive  all  the  truths  of  the  Bible  ;  all  the 
truths  that  are  not  in  the  Bible  just  as  much.  It  is  Christian 
also  to  reject  all  the  errors  that  come  to  us  from  without  the 
Bible  or  from  within  the  Bible.  The  Christian  man,  or  the 
Christian  church,  is  to  stop  at  no  man's  limitation  ;  at  the 
limit  of  no  book.  God  is  not  dead,  nor  even  asleep,  but 
awake  and  alive  as  ever  of  old  ;  He  inspires  men  now  no 
less  than  beforetime  ;  is  ready  to  fill  your  mind,  heart  and 
soul  with  truth,  love,  life,  as  to  fill  Moses  and  Jesus,  and 
that  on  the  same  terms  ;  for  inspiration  comes  by  universal 
laws,  and  not  by  partial  exceptions.  Each  point  of  spirit, 
as  each  atom  of  space,  is  still  bathed  in  the  tides  of  Deity. 
But  all  good  men,  all  Christian  men,  all  inspired  men  will 
be  no  more  alike  than  all  wicked  men.  It  is  the  same 
light  which  is  blue  in  the  sky  and  golden  in  the  sun.  "  All 
nature's  difference  makes  all  nature's  peace." 

We  can  attain  this  relation  to  man  and  God  only  on  con- 
dition that  we  are  free.  If  a  church  cannot  allow  freedom 
it  were  better  not  to  allow  itself,  but  cease  to  be.  Unity  of 
purpose,  with  entire  freedom  for  the  individual,  should  be 
the  motto.  It  is  only  free  men  that  can  find  the  truth,  love 
the  truth,  live  the  truth.  As  much  freedom  as  you  shut 
out,  so  much  falsehood  do  you  shut  in.  It  is  a  poor  thing  to 
purchase  unity  of  church-action  at  the  cost  of  individual 


22  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

freedom.  The  Catholic  church  tried  it,  and  you  see  what 
came  thereof:  science  forsook  it,  calling  it  a  den  of  lies. 
Morality  forsook  it,  as  the  mystery  of  iniquily,  and  religion 
herself  protested  against  it,  as  the  mother  of  abominations. 
The  Protestant  churches  are  trying  the  same  thing,  and  see 
whither  they  tend  and  what  foes  rise  up  against  them, 
Philosophy  with  its  Bible  of  nature,  and  Religion  with  its 
Bible  of  man  both  the  hand-writing  of  God.  The  great 
problem  of  church  and  state  is  this  :  To  produce  unity  of 
action  and  yet  leave  individual  freedom  not  disturbed  ;  to 
balance  into  harmonious  proportions  the  mass  and  the 
man,  the  centripetal  and  centrifugal  powers,  as,  by  God's 
wondrous,  living  mechanism,  they  are  balanced  in  the  worlds 
above.  In  the  state  we  have  done  this  more  wisely  than 
any  nation  heretofore.  In  the  churches  it  remains  yet  to  do. 
But  man  is  equal  to  all  which  God  appoints  for  him.  His 
desires  are  ever  proportionate  to  his  duty  and  his  destinies. 
The  strong  cry  of  the  nations  for  liberty,  a  craving  as  of 
hungry  men  for  bread  and  water,  shows  what  liberty  is 
worth,  and  what  it  is  destined  to  do.  Allow  freedom  to  think, 
and  there  will  be  truth ;  freedom  to  act,  and  we  shall  have 
heroic  works  ;  freedom  to  live  and  be,  and  we  shall  have 
love  to  men  and  love  to  God.  The  world's  history  proves 
that,  and  our  own  history.  Jesus,  our  model-man,  was  the 
freest  the  world  ever  saw  ! 

Let  it  be  remembered  that  every  truth  is  of  God,  and 
will  lead  to  good  and  good  only.  Truth  is  the  seed 
whereof  welfare  is  the  fruit;  for  every  grain  thereof  we 
plant  some  one  shall  reap  a  whole  harvest  of  welfare.  A 
lie  is  "  of  the  Devil,"  and  must  lead  to  want  and  woe  and 
death,  ending  at  last  in  a  storm  where  it  rains  tears  and 
perhaps  blood.  Have  freedom,  and  you  will  sow  new  truth 
to  reap  its  satisfaction  ;  submit  to  thraldom,  and  you  sow  lies 
to  reap  the  death  they  bear.  A  Christian  church  should  be 
the  home  of  the  soul,  where  it  enjoys  the  largest  liberty  of 
the  sons  of  God.  If  fettered  elsewhere,  here  let  us  be  free. 


0V    A    CHRISTIAN    CHUKCH. 

Christ  is  the  liberator ;  he  came  not  to  drive  slaves,  but  to 
set  men  free.  The  churches  of  old  did  their  greatest  work, 
when  there  was  most  freedom  in  those  churches. 

Here  too  should  the  spirit  of  devotion  be.  encouraged  ; 
the  soul  of  man  communing  with  his  God  in  aspirations  after 
purity  and  truth,  in  resolutions  for  goodness,  and  piety, 
and  a  manly  life.  These  are  a  prayer.  The  fact  that  men 
freely  hold  truths  in  common,  great  truths  and  universal ; 
that  unitedly  they  lift  up  their  souls  to  God  seeking  in- 
struction of  Him,  this  will  prove  the  strongest  bond  between 
man  and  man.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  Protestant  churches 
have  not  fully  done  justice  to  the  sentiment  of  worship  ;  that 
in  taking  care  of  the  head  we  have  forgotten  the  heart. 
To  think  truth  is  the  worship  of  the  head  ;  to  do  noble 
works  of  usefulness  and  charity  the  worship  of  the  will  ;  to 
feel  love  and  trust  in  man  and  God,  is  the  glad  worship  of 
the  heart.  A  Christian  church  should  be  broad  enough  for 
all  ;  should  seek  truth  and  promote  piety,  that  both  to- 
gether might  toil  in  good  works. 

Here  should  be  had  the  best  instruction  which  can  be  com- 
manded ;  the  freest,  truest,  and  most  manly  voice  ;  the  mind 
most  conversant  with  truth  ;  the  eloquence  of  a  heart  that 
runs  over  with  goodness,  whose  faith  is  unfaltering  in  truth, 
justice,  purity,  and  love  ;  a  faith  in  God,  whose  charity  is 
living  love  to  men,  even  the  sinful  and  the  base.  Teaching 
is  the  breathing  of  one  man's  inspiration  into  another,  a 
most  real  thing  amongst  real  men.  In  a  church  there  should 
be  instruction  for  the  young.  God  appoints  the  father  and 
mother  the  natural  teachers  of  children  ;  above  all  is  it  so  in 
their  religious  culture.  But  there  are  some  who  cannot, 
many  who  will  not  fulfil  this  trust.  Hence  it  has  been 
found  necessary  for  wise  and  good  men  to  offer  their  in- 
struction to  such.  In  this  matter  it  is  religion  we  need 
more  than  theology,  and  of  this  it  is  not  mere  traditions  and 
mythologies  we  are  to  teach,  the  anile  tales  of  a  rude  people 
in  a  dark  age,  things  our  pupils  will  do  well  to  forget  soon 


24  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

as  they  are  men,  and  which  they  will  have  small  reason  to 
thank  us  for  obscuring  their  minds  withal ;  but  it  is  the 
great,  everlasting  truths  of  religion  which  should  be  taught, 
enforced  by  examples  of  noble  men,  which  tradition  tells  of, 
or  the  present  age  affords,  all  this  to  be  suited  to  the  tender 
years  of  the  child.  Christianity  should  be  represented  as 
human,  as  man's  nature  in  its  true  greatness ;  religion  shown 
to  be  beautiful,  a  real  duty  corresponding  to  man's  deepest 
desire,  that  as  religion  affords  the  deepest  satisfaction  to 
man,  so  it  is  man's  most  universal  want.  Christ  should  be 
shown  to  men  as  he  was,  the  manliest  of  men,  the  most 
divine  because  the  most  human.  Children  should  be  taught 
to  respect  their  nature  ;  to  consider  it  as  the  noblest  of  all 
God's  works ;  to  know  that  perfect  truth  and  goodness  are 
demanded  of  them,  and  by  that  only  can  they  be  worthy 
men  ;  taught  to  feel  that  God  is  present  in  Boston  and  to- 
day, as  much  as  ever  in  Jerusalem  in  the  time  of  Jesus. 
They  should  be  taught  to  abhor  the  public  sins  of  our  times, 
but  to  love  and  imitate  its  great  examples  of  nobleness,  and 
practical  religion,  which  stand  out  amid  the  mob  of  worldly 
pretenders  in  this  day. 

Then,  too,  if  one  of  our  members  falls  into  unworthy 
ways,  is  it  not  the  duty  of  some  one  to  speak  with  him,  not 
as  with  authority  to  command,  but  with  affection  to  persuade  ? 
Did  any  one  of  you  ever  address  an  erring  brother  on  the 
folly  of  his  ways  with  manly  tenderness,  and  try  to  charm 
him  back,  and  find  a  cold  repulse  ?  If  a  man  is  in  error  he 
will  be  grateful  to  one  that  tells  him  so  ;  will  learn  most 
from  men  who  make  him  ashamed  of  his  littleness  of  life. 
In  this  matter  it  seems  many  a  good  man  comes  short  of  his 
duty. 

There  is  yet  another  way  in  which  a  church  should  act  on 
its  own  household,  and  that  is  by  direct  material  help  in  time 
of  need.  There  is  the  eternal  distinction  of  the  strong  and 
the  weak,  which  cannot  be  changed.  But  as  things  now  go 
there  is  another  inequality  not  of  God's  appointment,  but  of 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  25 

man's  perversity,  the  distinction  of  rich  and  poor  —  of  men 
bloated  by  superfluous  wealth,  and  men  starving  and  freezing 
from  want.  You  know  and  I  know  how  often  the  strong 
abuse  their  strength,  exerting  it  solely  for  themselves  and 
to  the  ruin  of  the  weak  ;  we  all  know  that  such  are  reckoned 
great  in  the  world,  though  they  may  have  grown  rich  solely 
by  clutching  at  what  others  earned.  In  Christianity,  and 
before  the  God  of  justice,  all  men  are  brothers  ;  the  strong 
are  so  that  they  may  help  the  weak.  As  a  nation  chooses 
its  wisest  men  to  manage  its  affairs  for  the  nation's  good, 
and  not  barely  their  own,  so  God  endows  Charles  or  Samuel 
with  great  gifts  that  they  may  also  bless  all  men  thereby. 
If  they  use  those  powers  solely  for  their  pleasure  then  are 
they  false  before  men  ;  false  before  God.  It  is  said  of  the 
church  of  the  Friends  that  no  one  of  their  number  has  ever 
received  the  charity  of  an  alms-house,  or  for  a  civil  oflence 
been  shut  up  in  a  jail.  If  the  poor  forsake  a  church,  be 
sure  that  the  church  forsook  God  long  before. 

But  the  church  must  have  an  action  on  others  out  of  its 
pale.  If  a  man  or  a  society  of  men  have  a  truth,  they  hold 
it  not  for  themselves  alone,  but  for  all  men.  The  solitary 
thinker,  who  in  a  moment  of  ecstatic  action  in  his  closet  at 
midnight  discovers  a  truth,  discovers  it  for  all  the  world  and 
for  eternity.  A  Christian  church  ought  to  love  to  see  its 
truths  extend;  so  it  should  put  them  in  contact  with  the 
opinions  of  the  world,  not  with  excess  of  zeal  or  lack  of 
charity. 

A  Christian  church  should  be  a  means  of  reforming  the 
world,  of  forming  it  after  the  pattern  of  Christian  ideas. 
It  should  therefore  bring  up  the  sentiments  of  the  times, 
the  ideas  of  the  times,  and  the  actions  of  the  times,  to 
judge  them  by  the  universal  standard.  In  this  way  it  will 
learn  much  and  be  a  living  church,  that  grows  with  the 
advance  of  men's  sentiments,  ideas  and  actions,  and  while 
it  keeps  the  good  of  the  past  will  lose  no  brave  spirit  of  the 
3 


26  THE    TRUE    I1>EA 

present  day.  It  can  teach  much  ;  now  moderating  the  fury 
of  men,  then  quickening  their  sluggish  steps.  We  expect 
the  sins  of  commerce  to  be  winked- at  in  the  street;  the 
sins  of  the  state  to  be  applauded  on  election  days  and  in  a 
Congress,  or  on  the  fourth  of  July  ;  we  are  used  to  hear 
them  called  the  righteousness  of  the  nation.  There  they 
are  often  measured  by  the  avarice  or  the  ambition  of  greedy 
men.  You  expect  them  to  be  tried  by  passion,  which  looks 
only  to  immediate  results  and  partial  ends.  Here  they  are 
to  be  measured  by  Conscience  and  Reason,  which  look  to 
permanent  results  and  universal  ends ;  to  be  looked  at  with 
reference  to  the  Laws  of  God,  the  everlasting  ideas  on 
which  alone  is  based  the  welfare  of  the  world.  Here  they 
are  to  be  examined  in  the  light  of  Christianity  itself.  If  the 
church  be  true,  many  things  which  seem  gainful  in  the 
street  and  expedient  in  the  senate-house,  will  here  be  set 
down  as  wrong,  and  all  gain  which  comes  therefrom  seen  to 
be  but  a  loss.  If  there  be  a  public  sin  in  the  land,  if  a  lie 
invade  the  state,  it  is  for  the  church  to  give  the  alarm  ;  it  is 
here  that  it  may  war  on  lies  and  sins ;  the  more  widely  they 
are  believed  in  and  practised  the  more  are  they  deadly,  the 
more  to  be  opposed.  Here  let  no  false  idea  or  false  action 
of  the  public  go  without  exposure  and  rebuke.  But  let  no 
noble  heroism  of  the  times,  no  noble  man  pass  by  without 
due  honor.  If  it  is  a  good  thing  to  honor  dead  saints  and 
the  heroism  of  our  fathers ;  it  is  a  better  thing  to  honor  the 
saints  of  to-day,  the  live  heroism  of  men  who  do  the  battle, 
when  that  battle  is  all  around  us.  I  know  a  few  such  saints ; 
here  and  there  a  hero  of  that  stamp,  and  I  will  not  wait  till 
they  are  dead  and  classic  before  I  call  them  so  and  honor 
them  as  such,  for 

"  To  side  with  truth  is  noble  when  we  share  her  wretched  crust, 
Ere  her  cause  bring  fame  and  profit,  and  't  is  prosperous  to  be  just ; 
Then  it  is  the  brave  man  chooses,  while  the  coward  stands  aside, 
Doubting  in  his  abject  spirit,  till  his  Lord  is  crucified, 
And  the  multitude  make  virtue  of  the  faith  they  once  denied, 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  27 

For  Humanity  sweeps  onward  ;  where  to-day  the  martyr  stands, 
On  the  morrow  crouches  Judas,  with  the  silver  in  his  hands ; 
Far  in  front  the  cross  stands  ready,  and  the  crackling  fagots  burn, 
While  the  hooting  inob  of  yesterday  in  silent  awe  return 
To  glean  up  the  scattered  ashes  into  History's  golden  urn." 

Do  you  not  see  that  if  a  man  have  a  new  truth,  it  must 
be  reformatory  and  so  create  an  outcry?  It  will  seem 
destructive  as  the  farmer's  plough ;  like  that  it  is  so  to  tares 
and  thistles,  but  the  herald  of  the  harvest  none  the  less. 
In  this  way  a  Christian  church  should  be  a  society  for  pro- 
moting true  sentiments  and  ideas.  If  it  would  lead,  it  must 
go  before  men ;  if  it  would  be  looked  up  to,  it  must  stand 
high. 

That  is  not  all :  It  should  be  a  society  for  the  promotion 
of  good  works.  We  are  all  beneath  our  idea,  and  therefore 
transgressors  before  God.  Yet  He  gives  us  the  rain,  the 
snow  and  the  sun.  It  falls  on  me  as  well  as  on  the  field  of 
my  neighbor,  who  is  a  far  juster  man.  How  can  we  repent, 
cast  our  own  sins  behind  us,  outgrow  and  forget  them 
better,  than  by  helping  others  to  work  out  their  salvation  ? 
We  are  all  brothers  before  God.  Mutually  needful  we 
must  be ;  mutually  helpful  we  should  be.  Here  are  the 
ignorant  that  ask  our  instruction,  not  with  words  only,  but 
with  the  prayer  of  their  darkness,  far  more  suppliant  than 
speech.  I  never  see  an  ignorant  man  younger  than  myself, 
without  a  feeling  of  self-reproach,  for  I  ask  :  "  What  have  I 
been  doing  to  suffer  him  to  grow  up  in  nakedness  of  mind  ?  " 
Every  man,  born  in  New  England,  who  does  not  share  the 
culture  of  this  age,  is  a  reproach  to  more  than  himself,  and 
will  at  last  actively  curse  those  who  began  by  deserting  him. 
The  Christian  church  should  lead  the  movement  for  the 
public  education  of  the  people. 

Here  are  the  needy  who  ask  not  so  much  your  gold,  your 
bread,  or  your  cloth,  as  they  ask  also  your  sympathy, 
respect  and  counsel ;  that  you  assist  them  to  help  themselves, 
that  they  may  have  gold  won  by  their  industry,  not  begged 


28  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

out  of  your  benevolence.  It  is  justice  more  than  charity 
they  ask.  Every  beggar,  every  pauper,  born  and  bred 
amongst  us  is  a  reproach  to  us,  and  condemns  our  civiliza- 
tion. For  how  has  it  come  to  pass  that  in  a  land  of  abund- 
ance here  are  men,  for  no  fault  of  their  own,  born  into  want, 
living  in  want,  and  dying  of  want  ?  and  that  while  we  pre- 
tend to  a  religion  which  says  all  men  are  brothers  !  There 
is  a  horrid  wrong  somewhere. 

Here  too  are  the  drunkard,  the  criminal,  the  abandoned 
person,  sometimes  the  foe  of  society,  but  far  oftener  the 
victim  of  society.  Whence  come  the  tenants  of  our  alms- 
houses,  jails,  the  victims  of  vice  in  all  our  towns  ?  Why, 
from  the  lowest  rank  of  the  people ;  from  the  poorest  and 
most  ignorant !  Say  rather  from  the  most  neglected,  and 
the  public  sin  is  confessed  and  the  remedy  hinted  at.  What 
have  the  strong  been  doing  all  this  while,  that  the  weak 
have  come  to  such  a  state  ?  Let  them  answer  for  them- 
selves. 

Now  for  all  these  ought  a  Christian  church  to  toil.  It 
should  be  a  church  of  good  works ;  if  it  is  a  church  of  good 
faith  it  will  be  so.  Docs  not  Christianity  say  the  strong 
should  help  the  weak  ?  Does  not  that  mean  something  ? 
It  once  did.  Has  the  Christian  fire  faded  out  from  those 
words,  once  so  marvellously  bright  ?  Look  round  you,  in 
the  streets  of  your  own  Boston !  See  the  ignorant,  men 
and  women  with  scarce  more  than  the  stature  of  men  and 
women ;  boys  and  girls  growing  up  in  ignorance  and  the 
low  civilization  which  comes  thereof,  the  barbarians  of 
Boston.  Their  character  will  one  day  be  a  blot  and  a  curse 
to  the  nation,  and  who  is  to  blame  ?  Why,  the  ablest  and 
best  men,  who  might  have  had  it  otherwise  if  they  would. 
Look  at  the  poor,  men  often  of  small  ability,  weak  by 
nature,  born  into  a  weak  position,  therefore  doubly  weak ; 
men  whom  the  strong  use  for  their  purpose,  and  then  cast 
them  off  as  we  throw  away  the  rind  of  an  orange  after  wo 
have  drunk  its  generous  juice.  Behold  the  wicked,  so  we 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  29 

call  the  weak  men  that  are  publicly  caught  in  the  cobweb 
of  the  law ;  ask  why  they  became  wicked  ;  how  we  have 
aimed  to  reform  them  ;  what  we  have  done  to  make  them 
respect  themselves,  to  believe  in  goodness,  in  man  and  God  ? 
and  then  say  if  there  is  not  something  for  .Christian  men  to 
do,  something  for  a  Christian  church  to  do !  Every  alms- 
house  in  Massachusetts  shows  that  the  churches  have  not  done 
their  duty,  that  the  Christians  lie  lies  when  they  call  Jesus 
"  master  "  and  men  "  brothers  "  !  Every  jail  is  a  monument, 
on  which  it  is  writ  in  letters  of  iron  that  we  are  still  hea- 
thens, and  the  gallows,  black  and  hideous,  the  embodiment 
of  death,  the  last  argument  a  "  Christian  "  State  offers  to 
the  poor  wretches  it  trained  up  to  be  criminals,  stands  there 
a  sign  of  our  infamy,  and  while  it  lifts  its  horrid  arm  to 
crush  the  life  out  of  some  miserable  man,  whose  blood  cries 
to  God  against  Cain  in  the  nineteenth  century,  it  lifts  that 
same  arm  as  an  index  of  our  shame ! 

Is  that  all  ?  Oh,  no  !  Did  not  Jesus  say,  resist  not  evil  — 
with  evil  ?  Is  not  war  the  worst  form  of  that  evil ;  and  is 
there  on  earth  a  nation  so  greedy  of  war ;  a  nation  more 
reckless  of  provoking  it ;  one  where  the  war-horse  so  soon 
conducts  his  foolish  rider  into  fame  and  power  ?  The 
"  Heathen  "  Chinese  might  send  their  missionaries  to  Amer- 
ica, and  teach  us  love  to  men  !  Is  that  all  ?  Far  from  it. 
Did  not  Christ  say  whatsoever  you  would  that  men  should 
do  unto  you,  do  you  even  so  unto  them  ;  and  are  there  not 
three  million  brothers  of  yours  and  mine  in  bondage  here, 
the  hopeless  sufferers  of  a  savage  doom  ;  debarred  from  the 
civilization  of  our  age,  the  barbarians  of  the  nineteenth 
century  ;  shut  out  from  the  pretended  religion  of  Christen- 
dom, the  heathens  of  a  Christian  land  ;  chained  down  from 
the  liberty  unalienable  in  man,  the  slaves  of  a  Christian 
republic  ?  Does  not  a  cry  of  indignation  ring  out  from 
every  legislature  in  the  North  ;  does  not  the  press  war  with 
its  million  throats,  and  a  voice  of  indignation  go  up  from 
East  and  West,  out  from  the  hearts  of  freemen  ?  Oh,  no. 
3* 


30  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

There  is  none  of  that  cry  against  the  mightiest  sin  of  this 
age.  The  rock  of  Plymouth,  sanctified  by  the  feet  which 
led  a  nation's  way  to  freedom's  large  estate,  provokes  no 
more  voice  than  the  rottenest  stone  in  all  the  mountains  of 
the  West.  The  few  that  speak  a  manly  word  for  truth  and 
everlasting  right,  are  called  fanatics ;  bid  be  still,  lest  they 
spoil  the  market !  Great  God  !  and  has  it  come  to  this,  that 
men  are  silent  over  such  a  sin  ?  'T  is  even  so.  Then  it 
must  be  that  every  church  which  dares  assume  the  name  of 
Christ,  that  dearest  name  to  men,  thunders  and  lightens  on 
this  hideous  wrong !  That  is  not  so.  The  church  is  dumb, 
while  the  state  is  only  silent ;  while  the  servants  of  the 
people  are  only  asleep,  "  God's  ministers  "  are  dead  ! 

In  the  midst  of  all  these  wrongs  and  sins,  the  crimes  of 
men,  society  and  the  state,  amid  popular  ignorance,  pauper- 
ism, crime,  and  war,  and  slavery  too  —  is  the  church  to  say 
nothing,  do  nothing ;  nothing  for  the  good  of  such  as  feel 
the  wrong,  nothing  to  save  them  who  do  the  wrong  ?  Men 
tell  us  so,  in  word  and  deed ;  that  way  alone  is  "  safe ! " 
If  I  thought  so,  I  would  never  enter  the  church  but  once 
again,  and  then  to  bow  my  shoulders  to  their  manliest  work, 
to  heave  down  its  strong  pillars,  arch  and  dome,  and  roof, 
and  wall,  steeple  and  tower,  though  like  Samson  I  buried 
myself  under  the  ruins  of  that  temple  which  profaned  the 
worship  of  God  most  high,  of  God  most  loved.  I  would  do 
this  in  the  name  of  man ;  in  the  name  of  Christ  I  would  do 
it ;  yes,  in  the  dear  and  blessed  name  of  God. 

It  seems  to  me  that  a  church  which  dares  name  itself 
Christian,  the  Church  of  the  Redeemer  :  which  aspires  to 
be  a  true  church,  must  set  itself  about  all  this  business,  and 
be  not  merely  a  church  of  theology,  but  of  religion  ;  not  of 
faith  only,  but  of  works  ;  a  just  church  by  its  faith  bring- 
ing works  into  life.  It  should  not  be  a  church  termagant, 
which  only  peevishly  scolds  at  sin,  in  its  anile  way  ;  but  a 
church  militant  against  every  form  of  evil,  which  not  only 
censures,  but  writes  out  on  the  walls  of  the  world  the 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  31 

brave  example  of  a  Christian  life,  that  all  may  take  pattern 
therefrom.  Thus  only  can  it  become  the  church  trium- 
phant. If  a  church  were  to  waste  less  time  in  building  its 
palaces  of  theological  speculation,  palaces  mainly  of  straw, 
and  based  upon  the  chaff,  erecting  air-castles  and  fighting 
battles  to  defend  those  palaces  of  straw,  it  would  surely 
have  more  time  to  use  in  the  practical  good  works  of  the 
day.  If  it  thus  made  a  city  free  from  want  and  ignorance 
and  crime,  I  know  I  vent  a  heresy,  I  think  it  would  be 
quite  as  Christian  an  enterprise,  as  though  it  restored  all  the 
theology  of  the  dark  ages ;  quite  as  pleasing  to  God.  A 
good  sermon  is  a  good  thing,  no  doubt,  but  its  end  is  not 
answered  by  its  being  preached  ;  even  by  its  being  listened  to 
and  applauded  ;  only  by  its  awakening  a  deeper  life  in  the 
hearers.  But  in  the  multitude  of  sermons  there  is  danger 
lest  the  bare  hearing  thereof  be  thought  a  religious  duty, 
not  a  means,  but  an  end,  and  so  our  Christianity  vanish  in 
words.  What  if  every  Sunday  afternoon  the  most  pious 
and  manly  of  our  number,  who  saw  fit,  resolved  themselves 
into  a  committee  of  the  whole  for  practical  religion,  and 
held  not  a  formal  meeting,  but  one  more  free,  sometimes 
for  the  purpose  of  devotion,  the  practical  work  of  making 
ourselves  better  Christians,  nearer  to  one  another,  and 
sometimes  that  we  might  find  means  to  help  such  as  needed 
help,  the  poor,  the  ignorant,  the  intemperate  and  the 
wicked  ?  Would  it  not  be  a  work  profitable  to  ourselves, 
and  useful  to  others  weaker  than  we  ?  For  my  own  part  I 
think  there  are  no  ordinances  of  religion  like  good  works ; 
no  day  too  sacred  to  help  my  brother  in ;  no  Christianity 
like  a  practical  love  of  God  shown  by  a  practical  love  of 
men.  Christ  told  us  that  if  we  had  brought  our  gift  to  the 
very  altar,  and  there  remembered  our  brother  had  cause  of 
complaint  against  us,  we  must  leave  the  divine  service,  and 
pay  the  human  service  first !  If  my  brother  be  in  slavery, 
in  want,  in  ignorance,  in  sin,  and  I  can  aid  him  and  do 
not,  he  has  much  against  me,  and  God  can  better  wait  for 
my  prayer  than  my  brother  for  my  help  ! 


'.}•>  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

The  saints  of  olden  time  perished  at  the  stake ;  they 
hung  on  gibbets  ;  they  agonized  upon  the  rack ;  they  died 
under  the  steel  of  the  tormentor.  It  was  the  heroism  of 
our  fathers'  day  that  swam  the  unknown  seas ;  froze  in  the 
woods  ;  starved  with  want  and  cold  ;  fought  battles  with  the 
red  right  hand.  It  is  the  sainthood  and  heroism  of  our  day 
that  toils  for  the  ignorant,  the  poor,  the  weak,  the  oppressed, 
the  wicked.  Yes,  it  is  our  saints  and  heroes  who  fight 
fighting ;  who  contend  for  the  slave,  and  his  master  too,  for 
the  drunkard,  the  criminal ;  yes,  for  the  wicked  or  the  weak 
in  all  their  forms.  It  is  they  that  with  weapons  of  heavenly 
proof  fight  the  great  battle  for  the  souls  of  men.  Though 
I  detest  war  in  each  particular  fibre  of  my  heart,  yet  I 
honor  the  heroes  among  our  fathers  who  fought  with  bloody 
hand  ;  peace-makers  in  a  savage  way  they  were  faithful  to 
their  light ;  the  most  inspired  can  be  no  more,  and  we,  with 
greater  light,  do,  it  may  be,  far  less.  I  love  and  venerate 
the  saints  of  old  ;  men  who  dared  step  in  front  of  their 
age  ;  accepted  Christianity  when  it  cost  something  to  be  a 
Christian,  because  it  meant  something ;  they  applied  Chris- 
tianity, so  far  as  they  knew  it,  to  the  lies  and  sins  of  their 
times,  and  won  a  sudden  and  a  fiery  death.  But  the  saints 
and  the  heroes  of  this  day,  who  draw  no  sword,  whose 
right  hand  is  never  bloody,  who  burn  in  no  fires  of  wood  or 
sulphur,  nor  languish  briefly  on  the  hasty  cross  ;  the  saints 
and  heroes  who,  in  a  worldly  world,  dare  to  be  men  ;  in  an 
age  of  conformity  and  selfishness,  speak  for  Truth  and 
Man,  living  for  noble  aims  ;  men  who  will  swear  to  no  lies 
howsoever  popular ;  who  will  honor  no  sins,  though  never 
so  profitable,  respected  and  ancient ;  men  who  count  Christ 
not  their  master,  but  teacher,  friend,  brother,  and  strive 
like  him  to  practise  all  they  pray ;  to  incarnate  and  make 
real  the  Word  of  God,  these  men  I  honor  far  more  than  the 
saints  of  old.  I  know  their  trials,  I  see  their  dangers,  I 
appreciate  their  sufferings,  and  since  the  day  when  the  man 
on  Calvary  bowed  his  head,  bidding  persecution  farewell 


OP    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  33 

with  his  "  Father,  forgive  them,  for  they  know  not  what 
they  do,"  I  find  no  such  saints  and  heroes  as  live  now ! 
They  win  hard  fare,  and  hard  toil.  They  lay  up  shame 
and  obloquy.  Theirs  is  the  most  painful  of  martyr- 
doms. Racks  and  fagots  soon  waft  the  soul  to  God,  stern 
messengers  but  swift.  A  boy  could  bear  that  passage,  the 
martyrdom  of  death.  But  the  temptation  of  a  long  life  of 
neglect,  and  scorn,  and  obloquy,  and  shame,  and  want,  and 
desertion  by  false  friends ;  to  live  blameless  though  blamed, 
cut  off  from  human  sympathy,  that  is  the  martyrdom  of 
to-day.  I  shed  no  tears  for  such  martyrs.  I  shout  when  I 
see  one ;  I  take  courage  and  thank  God  for  the  real  saints, 
prophets  and  heroes  of  to-day.  In  another  age,  men  shall 
be  proud  of  these  puritans  and  pilgrims  of  this  day. 
Churches  shall  glory  in  their  names  and  celebrate  their 
praise  in  sermon  and  in  song.  Yea,  though  now  men 
would  steal  the  rusty  sword  from  underneath  the  bones  of  a 
saint  or  hero  long  deceased,  to  smite  off  therewith  the  head 
of  a  new  prophet,  that  ancient  hero's  son  ;  though  they 
would  gladly  crush  the  heart  out  of  him  with  the  tomb- 
stones they  piled  up  for  great  men,  dead  and  honored  now, 
yet  in  some  future  day,  that  mob,  penitent,  baptized  with  a 
new  spirit,  like  drunken  men  returned  to  sanity  once  more, 
shall  search  through  all  this  land  for  marble  white  enough 
to  build  a  monument  to  that  prophet  whom  their  fathers 
slew  ;  they  shall  seek  through  all  the  world  for  gold  of 
fineness  fit  to  chronicle  such  names  !  I  cannot  wait ;  but  I 
will  honor  such  men  now,  not  adjourn  the  warning  of  their 
voice,  and  the  glory  of  their  example,  till  another  age ! 
The  church  may  cast  out  such  men ;  burn  them  with  the 
torments  of  an  age  too  refined  in  its  cruelty  to  use  coarse 
fagots  and  the  vulgar  axe  !  It  is  no  less  to  these  men ;  but 
the  ruin  of  the  church.  I  say  the  Christian  church  of  the 
nineteenth  century  must  honor  such  men,  if  it  would  do  a 
church's  work ;  must  take  pains  to  make  such  men  as  these, 
or  it  is  a  dead  church,  with  no  claim  on  us,  except  that  we 


34  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

bury  it.  A  true  church  will  always  be  the  church  of 
martyrs.  The  ancients  commenced  every  great  work  with 
a  victim  !  We  do  not  call  it  so  ;  but  the  sacrifice  is 
demanded,  got  ready,  and  offered  by  unconscious  priests 
long  ere  the  enterprise  succeeds.  Did  not  Christianity 
begin  with  a  martyrdom  ? 

In  this  way,  by  gaining  all  the  truth  of  the  age  in  thought 
or  action,  hy  trying  public  opinions  with  its  own  brave  ideas, 
by  promoting  good  works,  applying  a  new  truth  to  an  old 
error,  and  with  unpopular  righteousness  overcoming  each 
popular  sin,  the  Christian  church  should  lead  the  civilization 
of  the  age.  The  leader  looks  before,  goes  before,  and 
knows  where  he  is  going  ;  knows  the  way  thither.  It  is 
only  on  this  condition  that  he  leads  at  all.  If  the  church  by 
looking  after  truth,  and  receiving  it  when  it  comes,  be  in 
unison  with  God,  it  will  be  in  unison  with  all  science,  which 
is  only  the  thought  of  God  translated  from  the  facts  of  nature 
into  the  \uords  of  men.  In  such  a  case,  ihe  church  will  not 
fear  philosophy,  nor  in  the  face  of  modern  science  aim  to 
re-establish  the  dreams  and  fables  of  a  ruder  day.  It  will 
not  lack  new  truth,  daring  only  to  quote,  nor  be  obliged  to 
sneak  behind  the  inspired  words  of  old  saints  as  its  only 
fortress,  for  it  will  have  words  just  as  truly  inspired,  dropping 
from  the  golden  mouths  of  saints  and  prophets  now.  For 
leaders  it  will  look  not  back,  but  forth  ;  will  fan  the  first 
faint  sparkles  of  that  noble  fire  just  newly  kindled  from  the 
skies  ;  not  smother  them  in  the  ashes  of  fires  long  spent ; 
not  quench  them  with  holy  water  from  Jordan  or  the  Nile. 
A  church  truly  Christian,  professing  Christ  as  its  model-man, 
and  aiming  to  stand  in  the  relation  he  stood,  must  lead  the 
way  in  moral  enterprises,  in  every  work  which  aims  directly 
at  the  welfare  of  man.  There  was  a  time  when  the  Chris- 
tian churches,  as  a  whole,  held  that  rank.  Do  they  now  ? 
Not  even  the  Quakers  —  perhaps  the  last  sect  that  aban- 
doned it.  A  prophet,  filled  with  love  of  man  and  love  of 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  35 

God,  is  not  therein  at  home.  I  speak  a  sad  truth,  and  I  say 
it  in  sorrow.  But  look  at  the  churches  of  this  city  :  do  they 
lead  the  Christian  movements  of  this  city — the  temperance 
movement,  the  peace  movement,  the  movement  for  the  free- 
dom of  men,  for  education,  the  movement  to  make  society 
more  just,  more  wise  and  good,  the  great  religious  move- 
ment of  these  times  —  for,  hold  down  our  eye-lids  as  we 
will,  there  is  a  religious  movement  at  this  day  on  foot,  such 
as  even  New  England  never  saw  before  ;  —  do  they  lead  in 
these  things  ?  Oh,  no,  not  at  all.  That  great  Christian 
orator,  one  of  the  noblest  men  New  England  has  seen  in4his 
century,  whose  word  has  even  now  gone  forth  to  the  nations 
beyond  the  sea,  while  his  spirit  has  gone  home  to  his  father, 
when  he  turned  his  attention  to  the  practical  evils  of  our 
time  and  our  land,  and  our  civilization,  vigorously  applying 
Christianity  to  life,  why  he  lost  favor  in  his  own  little  sect! 
They  feared  him,  soon  as  his  spirit  looked  over  their  narrow 
walls,  aspiring  to  lead  men  to  a  better  work.  1  know  men 
can  now  make  sectarian  capital  out  of  the  great  name  of 
Channing,  so  he  is  praised ;  perhaps  praised  loudest  by  the 
very  men  who  then  cursed  him  by  their  gods.  Ay,  by  their 
gods  he  was  accursed  !  The  churches  lead  the  Christian 
movements  of  these  times?  —  why,  has  there  not  just  been 
driven  out  of  this  city,  and  out  of  this  state,  a  man  con- 
spicuous in  all  these  movements,  after  five  and  twenty  years 
of  noble  toil  ;  driven  out  because  he  was  conspicuous  in 
them  !  You  know  it  is  so,  and  you  know  how  and  by  whom 
he  is  thus  driven  out !  * 

Christianity  is  humanity  ;  Christ  is  the  Son  of  man ; 
the  manliest  of  men ;  humane  as  a  woman ;  pious  and 
hopeful  as  a  prayer ;  but  brave  as  man's  most  daring 
thought.  He  has  led  the  world  in  morals  and  religion  for 
eighteen  hundred  years,  only  because  he  was  the  manliest 
man  in  it ;  the  humanest  and  bravest  man  in  it,  and  hence 

*  Rev.  John  Pierponi. 


36  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

the  divinest.  He  may  lead  it  eighteen  hundred  years  more, 
for  we  arc  bid  believe  that  God  can  never  make  again  a 
greater  man ;  no,  none  so  great.  But  the  churches  do  not 
lead  men  therein,  for  they  have  not  his  spirit ;  neither  that 
womanliness  which  wept  over  Jerusalem,  nor  that  manliness 
which  drew  down  fire  enough  from  heaven  to  light  the 
world's  altars  for  well-nigh  two  thousand  years. 

There  are  many  ways  in  which  Christ  may  be  denied  :  — 
one  is  that  of  the  bold  blasphemer,  who,  out  of  a  base  and 
haughty  heart  mocks,  scoffing  at  that  manly  man,  and  spits 
upon  the  nobleness  of  Christ !  There  are  few  such  deniers  : 
my  heart  mourns  for  them.  But  they  do  little  harm.  Reli- 
gion is  so  dear  to  men,  no  scoffing  word  can  silence  that, 
and  the  brave  soul  of  this  young  Nazarene  has  made  itself 
so  deeply  felt  that  scorn  and  mockery  of  him  are  but  an 
icicle  held  up  against  the  summer's  sun.  There  is  another 
way  to  deny  him,  and  that  is  :  —  to  call  him  Lord,  and  never 
do  his  bidding ;  to  stifle  free  minds  with  his  words ;  and 
with  the  authority  of  his  name  to  cloak,  to  mantle,  screen 
and  consecrate  the  follies,  errors,  sins  of  men!  From  this 
we  have  much  to  fear. 

The  church  that  is  to  lead  this  century  will  not  be  a  church 
creeping  on  all  fours ;  mewling  and  whining,  its  face  turned 
down,  its  eyes  turned  back.  It  must  be  full  of  the  brave, 
manly  spirit  of  the  day,  keeping  also  the  good  of  times 
past.  There  is  a  terrific  energy  in  this  age,  for  man  was 
never  so  much  developed,  so  much  the  master  of  himself 
before.  Great  truths,  moral  and  political,  have  come  to 
light.  They  fly  quickly.  The  iron  prophet  of  types  pub- 
lishes his  visions,  of  weal  or  woe,  to  the  near  and  far.  This 
marvellous  age  has  invented  steam,  and  the  magnetic  tele- 
graph, apt  symbols  of  itself,  before  which  the  miracles  of 
fable  are  but  an  idle  tale.  It  demands,  as  never  before, 
freedom  for  itself,  usefulness  in  its  institutions ;  truth  in  its 
teachings,  and  beauty  in  its  deeds.  Let  a  church  have  that 
freedom,  that  usefulness,  truth,  and  beauty,  and  the  energy 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  37 

of  this  age  will  be  on  its  side.  But  the  church  which  did 
for  the  fifth  century,  or  the  fifteenth,  will  not  do  for  this. 
What  is  well  enough  at  Rome,  Oxford  or  Berlin,  is  not  well 
enough  for  Boston.  It  must  have  our  ideas,  the  smell  of 
our  ground,  and  have  grown  out  of  the  religion  in  our  soul. 
The  freedom  of  America  must  be  there  before  this  energy 
will  come  ;  the  wisdom  of  the  nineteenth  century  before  its 
science  will  be  on  the  churches'  side,  else  that  science  will 
go  over  to  the  "  infidels." 

Our  churches  are  not  in  harmony  with  what  is  best  in  the 
present  age.  Men  call  their  temples  after  their  old  heroes 
and  saints  —  John,  Paul,  Peter,  and  the  like.  But  we  call 
nothing  else  after  the  old  names  ;  a  school  of  philosophy 
would  be  condemned  if  called  Aristotelian,  Platonic,  or 
even  Baconian.  We  out-travel  the  past  in  all  but  this.  In  the 
church  it  seems  taught  there  is  no  progress  unless  we  have 
all  the  past  on  our  back  ;  so  we  despair  of  having  men  fit 
to  call  churches  by.  We  look  back  and  not  forward.  We 
think  the  next  saint  must  talk  Hebrew  like  the  old  ones,  and 
repeat  the  same  mythology.  So  when  a  new  prophet  comes 
we  only  stone  him. 

A  church  that  believes  only  in  past  inspiration  will  appeal 
to  old  books  as  the  standard  of  truth  and  source  of  light  ;  will 
be  antiquarian  in  its  habits  ;  will  call  its  children  by  the  old 
names  ;  and  war  on  the  new  age,  not  understanding  the 
man-child  born  to  rule  the  world.  A  church  that  believes  in 
inspiration  now  will  appeal  to  God  ;  try  things  by  reason 
and  conscience  ;  aim  to  surpass  the  old  heroes  ;  baptize  its 
children  with  a  new  spirit,  and  using  the  present  age  will 
lead  public  opinion,  and  not  follow  it.  Had  Christ  looked 
back  for  counsel,  he  might  have  founded  a  church  fit  for 
Abraham  or  Isaac  to  worship  in,  not  for  the  ages  to  come, 
or  the  age  then.  He  that  feels  he  is  near  to  God,  does  not 
fear  to  be  far  from  men  ;  if  before,  he  helps  lead  them  on  ; 
if  above,  to  lift  them  up.  Let  us  get  all  we  can  from  the 
4 


1  ^~  n  c\ 

5  9  8 


38  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

Hebrews  and  others  of  old  time,  and  that  is  much  ;  but  still 
let  us  be  God's  free  men,  not  the  Gibeonites  of  the  past. 

Let  us  have  a  church  that  dares  imitate  the  heroism  of 
Jesus ;  seek  inspiration  as  he  sought  it ;  judge  the  past  as 
he  ;  act  on  the  present  like  him ;  pray  as  he  prayed  ;  work 
as  he  wrought ;  live  as  he  lived.  Let  our  doctrines  and  our 
forms  fit  the  soul,  as  the  limbs  fit  the  body,  growing  out  of 
it,  growing  with  it.  Let  us  have  a  church  for  the  whole 
man :  truth  for  the  mind ;  good  works  for  the  hands ; 
love  for  the  heart ;  and  for  the  soul,  that  aspiring  after  per- 
fection, that  unfaltering  faith  in  God  which,  like  lightning 
in  the  clouds,  shines  brightest,  when  elsewhere  it  is  most 
dark.  Let  our  church  fit  man,  as  the  heavens  fit  the  earth ! 

In  our  day  men  have  made  great  advances  in  science, 
commerce,  manufactures,  in  all  the  arts  of  life.  We  need, 
therefore,  a  development  of  religion  corresponding  thereto. 
The  leading  minds  of  the  age  ask  freedom  to  inquire  ;  not 
merely  to  believe,  but  to  know ;  to  rest  on  facts.  A  great 
spiritual  movement  goes  swiftly  forward.  The  best  men 
see  that  religion  is  religion  ;  theology  is  theology,  and  not 
religion ;  that  true  religion  is  a  very  simple  affair,  and  the 
popular  theology  a  very  foolish  one  ;  that  the  Christianity  of 
Christ  is  not  the  Christianity  of  the  street,  or  the  state,  or 
the  churches ;  that  Christ  is  not  their  model-man,  only 
"  imputed  "  as  such.  These  men  wish  to  apply  good  sense 
to  matters  connected  with  religion  ;  to  apply  Christianity  to 
life,  and  make  the  world  a  better  place,  men  and  women 
fitter  to  live  in  it.  In  this  way  they  wish  to  get  a  theology 
that  is  true ;  a  mode  of  religion  that  works,  and  works  well. 
If  a  church  can  answer  these  demands,  it  will  be  a  live 
church  ;  leading  the  civilization  of  the  times,  living  with  all 
the  mighty  life  of  this  age,  and  nation.  Its  prayers  will  be 
a  lifting  up  of  the  hearts  in  noble  men  towards  God,  in 
search  of  truth,  goodness,  piety.  Its  sacraments  will  be 
great  works  of  reform,  institutions  for  the  comfort  and  the  cul- 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  39 

turc  of  men.  Let  us  have  a  church  in  which  religion,  good- 
ness towards  men,  and  piety  towards  God,  shall  be  the  main 
thing ;  let  us  have  a  degree  of  that  suited  to  the  growth  and 
demands  of  this  age.  In  the  middle  ages,  men  had  errone- 
ous conceptions  of  religion,  no  doubt ;  yet  the  church  led 
the  world.  When  she  wrestled  with  the  state,  the  state 
came  undermost  to  the  ground.  See  the  results  of  that  su- 
premacy —  all  over  Europe  there  arose  the  cloister,  halls 
of  learning  for  the  chosen  few,  minster,  dome,  cathedral, 
miracles  of  art,  each  costing  the  wealth  of  a  province. 
Such  was  the  embodiment  of  their  ideas  of  religion,  the 
prayers  of  a  pious  age  done  in  stone,  a  psalm  petrified  as  it 
rose  from  the  world's  mouth ;  a  poor  sacrifice,  no  doubt, 
but  the  best  they  knew  how  to  offer.  Now  if  men  were  to 
engage  in  religion  as  in  politics,  commerce,  arts ;  if  the  ab- 
solute religion,  the  Christianity  of  Christ,  were  applied  to 
life  with  all  the  might  of  this  age,  as  the  Christianity  of  the 
church  was  then  applied,  what  a  result  should  we  not 
behold !  We  should  build  up  a  great  state  with  unity  in  the 
nation,  and  freedom  in  the  people ;  a  state  where  there  was 
honorable  work  for  every  hand,  bread  for  all  mouths,  cloth- 
ing for  all  backs,  culture  for  every  mind,  and  love  and  faith 
in  every  heart.  Truth  would  be  our  sermon,  drawn  from 
the  oldest  of  Scriptures,  God's  writing  there  in  nature,  here 
in  man  ;  works  of  daily  duty  would  be  our  sacrament ; 
prophets  inspired  of  God  would  minister  the  word,  and 
piety  send  up  her  psalm  of  prayer,  sweet  in  its  notes,  and 
joyfully  prolonged.  The  noblest  monument  to  Christ,  the 
fairest  trophy  of  religion,  is  a  noble  people,  where  all  are 
well  fed  and  clad,  industrious,  free,  educated,  manly,  pious, 
wise  and  good. 

Some  of  you  may  now  remember,  how  ten  months  and 
more  ago,  I  first  came  to  this  house  to  speak.  I  shall 
remember  it  for  ever.  In  those  rainy  Sundays  the  very  skies 
looked  dark.  Some  came  doubtingly,  uncertain,  looking 


40  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

around,  and  hoping  to  find  courage  in  another's  hope. 
Others  came  with  clear  glad  face  ;  openly,  joyfully,  certain 
they  were  right ;  not  fearing  to  meet  the  issue  ;  not  afraid 
to  be  seen  meeting  it.  Some  came,  perhaps,  not  used  to 
worship  in  a  church,  but  not  the  less  welcome  here  ;  some 
mistaking  me  for  a  destroyer,  a  doubter,  a  denier  of  all 
truth,  a  scoffer,  an  enemy  to  man  and  God  !  I  wonder  not 
at  that.  Misguided  men  had  told  you  so,  in  sermon  and  in 
song ;  in  words  publicly  printed  and  published  without 
shame  ;  in  the  covert  calumny,  slily  whispered  in  the  dark  ! 
Need  I  tell  you  my  feelings  ;  how  I  felt  at  coming  to  the 
town  made  famous  by  great  men,  Mayhew,  Chauncy, 
Buckminster,  Kirkland,  Holley,  Pierpont,  Channing,  Ware 
—  names  dear  and  honored  in  my  boyish  heart !  Need  I 
tell  you  how  I  felt  at  sight  of  the  work  which  stretched  out 
before  me  ?  Do  you  wonder  that  I  asked  :  Who  is  sufficient 
for  these  things  ?  and  said  :  Alas,  not  I,  Thou  knowest, 
Lord  !  But  some  of  you  told  me  you  asked  not  the  wisdom 
of  a  wiser  man,  the  ability  of  one  stronger,  but  only  that  I 
should  do  what  I  could.  I  came,  not  doubting  that  I  had 
some  truths  to  say  ;  not  distrusting  God,  nor  man,  nor  you  ; 
distrustful  only  of  myself.  I  feared  1  had  not  the  power, 
amid  the  dust  and  noises  of  the  day,  to  help  you  see  and 
hear  the  great  realities  of  religion  as  they  appeared  to  me ; 
to  help  you  feel  the  life  of  real  religion,  as  in  my  better 
moments  I  have  felt  its  truth !  But  let  that  pass.  As  I 
came  here  from  Sunday  to  Sunday,  when  I  began  to  feel 
your  spirits  prayed  with  mine  a  prayer  for  truth  and  life  ;  as 
as  1  looked  down  into  your  faces,  thoughtful  and  almost 
breathless,  I  forgot  my  self-distrust;  I  saw  the  time  was 
come  ;  that,  feebly  as  I  know  I  speak,  my  best  thoughts 
were  ever  the  most  welcome !  I  saw  that  the  harvest  was 
plenteous  indeed :  but  the  preacher,  I  feel  it  still,  was  all 
unworthy  of  his  work  ! 

Brothers  and  Sisters :  let  us  be  true  to  our  sentiments  and 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  41 

ideas.  Let  us  not  imitate  another's  form  unless  it  symbolize 
a  truth  to  us.  We  must  not  affect  to  be  singular,  but  not 
fear  to  be  alone.  Let  us  not  foolishly  separate  from  our 
brothers  elsewhere.  Truth  is  yet  before  us,  not  only 
springing  up  out  of  the  manly  words  of  this  Bible,  but  out  of 
the  ground ;  out  of  the  heavens ;  out  of  man  and  God.  Whole 
firmaments  of  truth  hang  ever  o'er  our  heads,  waiting  the 
telescopic  eye  of  the  true-hearted  see-er.  Let  us  follow 
truth,  in  form,  thought  or  sentiment,  wherever  she  may  call. 
God's  daughter  cannot  lead  us  from  the  path.  The  further 
on  we  go,  the  more  we  find.  Had  Columbus  turned  back 
only  the  day  before  he  saw  the  land,  the  adventure  had  been 
worse  than  lost. 

We  must  practise  a  manly  self-denial.  Religion  always 
demands  that,  but  never  more  than  when  our  brothers 
separate  from  us,  and  we  stand  alone.  By  our  mutual  love 
and  mutual  forbearance,  we  shall  stand  strong.  With  zeal 
for  our  common  work,  let  us  have  charity  for  such  as  dislike 
us,  such  as  oppose  and  would  oppress  us.  Let  us  love  our 
enemies,  bless  them  that  curse  us,  do  good  to  them  that  hate 
us,  and  pray  for  such  as  despitefully  use  us.  Let  us  over- 
come their  evil  speech  with  our  own  goodness.  If  others  have 
treated  us  ill,  called  us  unholy  names,  and  mocked  at  us,  let 
us  forgive  it  all,  here  and  now,  and  help  them  also  to  forget 
and  outgrow  that  temper  which  bade  them  treat  us  so.  A 
kind  answer  is  fittest  rebuke  to  an  unkind  word  ! 

If  we  have  any  truth  it  will  not  be  kept  hid.  It  will  run 
over  the  brim  of  our  urn  and  water  our  brothers'  field.  Were 
any  truth  to  come  down  to  us  in  advance  from  God,  it  were 
not  that  we  might  forestall  the  light,  but  shed  it  forth  for  all 
His  children  to  walk  by  and  rejoice  in.  "  One  candle  will 
light  a  thousand  "  if  it  be  itself  lighted.  Let  our  light  shine 
before  men  so  that  they  may  see  our  good  deeds,  and 
themselves  praise  God  by  a  manly  life.  This  we  owe  to 
them  as  to  ourselves.  A  noble  thought  and  a  mean  man 
make  a  sorry  union.  Let  our  idea  show  itself  in  our  life  — 
4* 


42  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

that  is  preaching,  right  eloquent.  Do  this,  we  begin  to  do 
good  to  men,  and  though  they  should  oppose  us,  and  our 
work  should  fail,  we  shall  have  yet  the  approval  of  our  own 
heart,  the  approval  of  God,  be  whole  within  ourselves,  and 
one  with  Him. 

Some  of  you  are  venerable  men.  I  have  wondered  that 
a  youthful  ardor  should  have  brought  you  here.  Your 
silvery  heads  have  seemed  a  benediction  to  my  work.  But 
most  of  you  are  young.  I  know  it  is  no  aping  of  a  fashion 
that  has  brought  you  here.  I  have  no  eloquence  to  charm 
or  please  you  with ;  I  only  speak  right  on.  I  have  no 
reputation  but  a  bad  name  in  the  churches.  I  know  you 
came  not  idly,  but  seeking  after  truth.  Give  a  great  idea  to 
an  old  man,  and  he  carries  it  to  his  grave ;  give  it  to  a  young 
man,  and  he  carries  it  to  his  life.  It  will  bear  both  young 
and  old  through  the  grave  and  into  eternal  Heaven  beyond. 

Young  men  and  women,  the  duties  of  the  world  fall 
eminently  on  you.  God  confides  to  your  hands  the  ark 
which  holds  the  treasures  of  the  age.  On  young  shoulders 
He  lays  the  burthen  of  life.  Yours  is  the  period  of  passion  ; 
the  period  of  enterprise  and  of  work.  It  is  by  successive 
generations  that  mankind  goes  forward.  The  old,  stepping 
into  honorable  graves,  leave  their  places  and  the  results  they 
won  to  you.  But  departing  they  seem  to  say,  as  they  linger 
and  look  back :  Do  ye  greater  than  we  have  done  !  The 
young  just  coming  into  your  homes  seem  to  say:  Instruct 
us  to  be  nobler  than  yourselves  !  Your  life  is  the  answer  to 
your  children  and  your  sires.  The  next  generation  will  be 
as  you  make  it.  It  is  not  the  schools  but  the  people's 
character  that  educates  the  child.  Amid  the  trials,  duties, 
dangers  of  your  life,  religion  alone  can  guide  you.  It  is  not 
the  world's  eye  that  is  on  you,  but  God's;  it  is  not  the 
world's  religion  that  will  suffice  you,  but  the  religion  of  a 
Man,  which  unites  you  with  truth,  justice,  piety,  goodness ; 
yes,  which  makes  you  one  with  God  ! 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  43 

Young  men  and  women  —  you  can  make  this  church  a 
fountain  of  life  to  thousands  of  fainting  souls.  Yes,  you  can 
make  this  city  nobler  than  city  ever  was  before.  A  manly 
life  is  the  best  gift  you  can  leave  mankind  ;  that  can  be 
copied  for  ever.  Architects  of  your  own  weal  or  woe,  your 
destiny  is  mainly  in  your  own  hands.  It  is  no  great  thing 
to  reject  the  popular  falsehoods ;  little  and  perhaps  not  hard. 
But  to  receive  the  great  sentiments  and  lofty  truths  of  real 
religion,  the  Christianity  of  Christ ;  to  love  them,  to  live 
them  in  your  business  and  your  home,  that  is  the  greatest 
work  of  man.  Thereby  you  partake  of  the  spirit  and  nature 
of  God  ;  you  achieve  the  true  destiny  for  yourself;  you  help 
your  brothers  do  the  same. 

When  my  own  life  is  measured  by  the  ideal  of  that  young 
Nazarene,  I  know  how  little  I  deserve  the  name  of  Christian  ; 
none  knows  that  fact  so  well  as  I.  But  you  have  been 
denied  the  name  of  Christian  because  you  came  here,  asking 
me  to  come.  Let  men  see  that  you  have  the  reality,  though 
they  withhold  the  name.  Your  words  are  the  least  part  of 
what  you  say  to  men.  The  foolish  only  will  judge  you  by 
your  talk  ;  wise  men  by  the  general  tenor  of  your  life.  Let 
your  religion  appear  in  your  work  and  your  play.  Pray  in 
your  strongest  hours.  Practise  your  prayers.  By  fair- 
dealing,  justice,  kindness,  self-control,  and  the  great  work  of 
helping  others  while  you  help  yourself,  let  your  life  prove  a 
worship.  These  are  the  real  sacraments  and  Christian 
communion  with  God,  to  which  water  and  wine  are  only 
helps.  Criticise  the  world  not  by  censure  only,  but  by  the 
example  of  a  great  life.  Shame  men  out  of  their  littleness, 
not  by  making  mouths,  but  by  walking  great  and  beautiful 
amongst  them.  You  love  God  best  when  you  love  men 
most.  Let  your  prayers  be  an  uplifting  of  the  soul  in 
thought,  resolution,  love,  and  the  light  thereof  shall  shine 
through  the  darkest  hour  of  trouble.  Have  not  the  Chris- 
tianity of  the  street ;  but  carry  Christ's  Christianity  there. 


44  THE    TRUE    IDEA 

Be  noble  men,  then  your  works  must  needs  be  great  and 
manly. 

This  is  the  first  Sunday  of  a  new  year.  What  an  hour 
for  resolutions ;  what  a  moment  for  prayer !  If  you  have 
sins  in  your  bosom,  cast  them  behind  you  now.  In  the  last 
year,  God  has  blessed  us ;  blessed  us  all.  On  some  his 
angels  waited,  robed  in  white,  and  brought  new  joys ;  here 
a  wife,  to  bind  men  closer  yet  to  Providence  ;  and  there  a 
child,  a  new  Messiah,  sent  to  tell  of  innocence  and  heaven. 
To  some  his  angels  came  clad  in  dark  livery,  veiling  a 
joyful  countenance  with  unpropitious  wings,  and  bore  away 
child,  father,  sister,  wife,  or  friend.  Still  were  they  angels 
of  good  Providence,  all  God's  own  ;  and  he  who  looks 
aright  finds  that  they  also  brought  a  blessing,  but  concealed, 
and  left  it,  though  they  spoke  no  word  of  joy.  One  day  our 
weeping  brother  shall  find  that  gift  and  wear  it  as  a  diamond 
on  his  breast. 

The  hours  are  passing  over  us,  and  with,  them  the  day. 
What  shall  the  future  Sundays  be,  and  what  the  year  ? 
What  we  make  them  both.  God  gives  us  time.  We  weave 
it  into  life,  such  figures  as  we  may,  and  wear  it  as  we  will. 
Age  slowly  rots  away  the  gold  we  are  set  in,  but  the  ada- 
mantine soul  lives  on,  radiant  every  way  in  the  light  stream- 
ing down  from  God.  The  genius  of  eternity,  star-crowned, 
beautiful,  and  with  prophetic  eyes,  leads  us  again  to  the 
gates  of  time,  and  gives  us  one  more  year,  bidding  us  fill 
that  golden  cup  with  water  as  we  can  or  will.  There  stand 
the  dirty,  fetid  pools  of  worldliness  and  sin ;  curdled,  and 
mantled,  film-covered,  streaked  and  striped  with  many  a 
hue,  they  shine  there,  in  the  slanting  light  of  new-born  day. 
Around  them  stand  the  sons  of  earth  and  cry  :  Come 
hither ;  drink  thou  and  be  saved  !  Here  fill  thy  golden 
cup  !  There  you  may  seek  to  fill  your  urn ;  to  stay  your 
thirst.  The  deceitful  element,  roping  in  your  hands,  shall 
mock  your  lip.  It  is  water  only  to  the  eye.  Nay,  show- 


OF    A    CHRISTIAN    CHURCH.  45 

water  only  unto  men  half-blind.  But  there,  hard  by,  runs 
down  the  stream  of  life,  its  waters  never  frozen,  never 
dry  ;  fed  by  perennial  dews  falling  unseen  from  God.  Fill 
there  thine  urn,  oh,  brother-man,  and  thou  shalt  thirst  no 
more  for  selfishness  and  crime,  and  faint  no  more  amid  the 
toil  and  heat  of  day  ;  wash  there,  and  the  leprosy  of  sin, 
its  scales  of  blindness,  shall  fall  off,  and  thou  be  clean 
for  ever.  Kneel  there  and  pray ;  God  shall  inspire  thy 
heart  with  truth  and  love,  and  fill  thy  cup  with  never-ending 
joy!* 

*  See  note  at  the  end  of  this  volume. 


III. 


A    SERMON    OF    WAR,    PREACHED    AT    THE    MELODEON,    ON    SUNDAY, 
JUNE  7,   1846. 


"THE  LORD  is  A  MAN  OF  WAR." — Exocrs,  XT.  3.      %. 
"  GOD  is  LOVE."  —  1  Jons,  iv.  8. 

I  ASK  your  attention  to  a  Sermon  of  War.  I  have  waited 
some  time  before  treating  this  subject  at  length,  till  the 
present  hostilities  should  assume  a  definite  form,  and  the 
designs  of  the  Government  become  more  apparent.  I  wished 
to  be  able  to  speak  coolly  and  with  knowledge  of  the  facts, 
that  we  might  understand  the  comparative  merits  of  the 
present  war.  Besides,  I  have  waited  for  others,  in  the 
churches,  of  more  experience  to  speak,  before  I  ventured  to 
offer  my  counsel ;  but  I  have  thus  far  waited  almost  in  vain  ! 
I  did  not  wish  to  treat  the  matter  last  Sunday,  for  that  was 
the  end  of  our  week  of  Pentecost,  when  cloven  tongues  of 
flame  descend  on  the  city,  and  some  are  thought  to  be  full  of 
new  wine,  and  others  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  The  heat  of  the 
meetings,  good  and  bad,  of  that  week,  could  not  wholly  have 
passed  away  from  you  or  me,  and  we  ought  to  come  coolly 
and  consider  a  subject  like  this.  So  the  last  Sunday  I  only 
sketched  the  back-ground  of  the  picture,  to-day  intending  to 
paint  the  horrors  of  war  in  front  of  that  "  Presence  of  Beauty 
in  Nature,"  to  which,  with  its  "  Meanings  "  and  its  "  Les- 
sons," I  then  asked  you  to  attend. 

It  seems  to  me  that  an  idea  of  God  as  the  Infinite  is  given 
to  us  in  our  nature  itself.  But  men  create  a  more  definite 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  47 

conception  of  God  in  their  own  image.  Thus  a  rude  savage 
man,  who  has  learned  only  the  presence  of  power  in  Nature, 
conceives  of  God  mainly  as  a  force,  and  speaks  of  Him  as 
a  God  of  power.  Such,  though  not  without  beautiful  ex- 
ceptions, is  the  character  ascribed  to  Jehovah  in  the  Old 
Testament.  "  The  Lord  is  a  man  of  war."  He  is  "  the 
Lord  of  Hosts."  He  kills  men,  and  their  cattle.  If  there 
is  trouble  in  the  enemies'  city,  it  is  the  Lord  who  hath  caused 
it.  He  will  "  whet  his  glittering  sword  and  render  ven- 
geance to  his  enemies.  He  will  made  his  arrows  drunk 
with  blood,  and  his  sword  shall  devour  flesh ! "  It  is  with 
the  sword  that  God  pleads  with  all  men.  He  encourages 
men  to  fight,  and  says,  "  Cursed  be.  he  that  keepeth  back  his 
sword  from  blood."  He  sends  blood  into  the  streets ;  he 
waters  the  land  with  blood,  and  in  blood  he  dissolves  the 
mountains.  He  brandishes  his  sword  before  kings,  and  they 
tremble  at  every  moment.  He  treads  nations  as  grapes  in 
a  wine-press,  and  his  garments  are  stained  with  their  life's 
blood.* 

*  Isaiah,  Lxiii.  1  —  6.  Noyes's  Version. 

The  People. 

1.  Who  is  this,  that  cometh  from  Edom  ? 
In  scarlet  garments  from  Bo/rah  ? 
This,  that  is  glorious  in  his  apparel, 
Proud  in  the  greatness  of  his  strength  ? 

Jehovah. 

I,  that  proclaim  deliverance, 
And  am  mighty  to  save. 

The  People. 

2.  Wherefore  is  thine  apparel  red, 

And  thy  garments  like  those  of  one  that  treadeth  the  wine-vat  ? 

Jehovah. 

• 

3.  I  have  trodden  the  wine-vat  alone, 

And  of  the  nations  there  was  none  with  me. 
And  I  trod  them  in  mine  anger, 


48  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

A  man  who  has  grown  up  to  read  the  Older  Testament  of 
God  revealed  in  the  beauty  of  the  universe,  and  to  feel  the 
goodness  of  God  therein  set  forth,  sees  Him  not  as  force 
only,  or  in  chief,  but  as  love.  He  worships  in  love  the  God 
of  goodness  and  of  peace.  Such  is  the  prevalent  character 
ascribed  to  God  in  the  New  Testament,  except  in  the  book 
of  "  Revelations."  He  is  the  "  God  of  love  and  peace  ; " 
"  our  Father,"  "  kind  to  the  unthankful  and  the  unmerciful." 
In  one  word%God  is  love.  He  loves  us  all,  Jew  and  Gentile, 
bond  and  free.  All  are  his  children,  each  of  priceless  value 
in  His  sight.  He  is  no  God  of  battles ;  no  Lord  of  hosts ; 
no  man  of  war.  He  has  no  sword,  nor  arrows  ;  He  does  not 
water  the  earth  nor  melt  the  mountains  in  blood,  but  "  He 
maketh  His  sun  to  rise  on  the  evil  and  on  the  good,  and 
sendeth  rain  on  the  just  and  the  unjust."  He  has  no  gar- 
ments dyed  in  blood  ;  curses  no  man  for  refusing  to  fight. 
He  is  spirit,  to  be  worshipped  in  spirit  and  in  truth !  The 
commandment  is :  Love  one  another  ;  resist  not  evil  with 
evil ;  forgive  seventy  times  seven ;  overcome  evil  with  good ; 
love  your  enemies ;  bless  them  that  curse  you ;  do  good  to 
them  that  hate  you  ;  pray  for  them  that  despitefully  use  you 
and  persecute  you.*  There  is  no  nation  to  shut  its  ports 


And  I  trampled  them  in  my  fury, 

So  that  their  life-blood  was  sprinkled  upon  my  garments, 

And  I  have  stained  all  my  apparel. 

4.  For  the  day  of  vengeance  was  in  my  heart, 
And  the  year  of  my  deliverance  was  come. 

5.  And  I  looked,  and  there  was  none  to  help, 
And  I  wondered,  that  there  was  none  to  uphold, 
Therefore  my  own  arm  wrought  salvation  for  me, 
And  my  fury,  it  sustained  me. 

6.  I  trod  down  the  nations  in  my  anger  ; 
I  crushed  them  in  my  fury, 

And  spilled  their  blood  upon  the  ground. 

*  To  show  the  differences  between  the  Old  and  New  Testament, 
and  to  serve  as  introduction  to  this  discourse,  the  following  passages 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  49 

against  another,  all  are  men ;  no  caste  to  curl  its  lip  at 
inferiors,  all  are  brothers,  members  of  one  body,  united  in 
the  Christ,  the  ideal  man  and  head  of  all.  The  most 
useful  is  the  greatest.  No  man  is  to  be  master,  for  the 
Christ  is  our  teacher.  We  are  to  fear  no  man,  for  God  is 
our  Father. 

These  precepts  are  undeniably  the  precepts  of  Christianity. 
Equally  plain  is  it  that  they  are  the  dictates  of  man's  nature, 
only  developed  and  active  ;  a  part  of  God's  universal  re- 
velation ;  His  law  writ  on  the  soul  of  man,  established  in  the 
nature  of  things  ;  true  after  all  experience,  and  true  before 
all  experience.  The  man  of  real  insight  into  spiritual  things 
sees  and  knows  them  to  be  true. 

Do  not  believe  it  the  part  of  a  coward  to  think  so.  I 
have  known  many  cowards  ;  yes,  a  great  many  ;  some  very 
cowardly,  pusillanimous  and  faint-hearted  cowards ;  but 
never  one  who  thought  so,  or  pretended  to  think  so.  It  re- 
quires very  little  courage  to  fight  with  sword  and  musket, 
and  that  of  a  cheap  kind.  Men  of  that  stamp  are  plenty  as 
grass  in  June.  Beat  your  drum,  and  they  will  follow  ;  offer 
them  but  eight  dollars  a  month,  and  they  will  come  —  fifty 
thousand  of  them,  to  smite  and  kill.*  Every  male  animal, 
or  reptile,  will  fight.  It  requires  little  courage  to  kill ;  but 
it  takes  much  to  resist  evil  with  good,  holding  obstinately 
out,  active  or  passive,  till  you  overcome  it.  Call  that  non- 
resistance,  if  you  will ;  it  is  the  stoutest  kind  of  combat, 
demanding  all  the  manhood  of  a  man. 

I  will  not  deny  that  war  is  inseparable  from  a  low  stage  of 
civilization  ;  so  is  polygamy,  slavery,  cannibalism.  Taking 
men  as  they  were,  savage  and  violent,  there  have  been  times 


were  read  as  the  morning  lesson :  Exodus,  xv.  1-6  ;  2  Sam.  xxii. 
32,  35-43,  48;  xlv.  3-5;  Isa.  Ixvi.  15,  16;  Joel,  iii.  9-17,  and 
Matt.  v.  3-11,  38-39,  43-45. 

*  Such  was  the  price  offered,  and  such  the  number  of  soldiers 
then  called  for. 

5 


50  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

when  war  was  unavoidable.  I  will  not  deny  that  it  has 
helped  forward  the  civilization  of  the  race,  for  God  often 
makes  the  folly  and  the  sin  of  men  contribute  to  the  pro- 
gress of  mankind.  It  is  none  the  less  a  folly  or  a  sin.  In 
a  civilized  nation  like  ourselves,  it  is  far  more  heinous  than 
in  the  Ojibeways  or  the  Camanches. 

War  is  in  utter  violation  of  Christianity.  If  war  be  right, 
then  Christianity  is  wrong,  false,  a  lie.  But  if  Christianity 
be  true,  if  reason,  conscience,  the  religious  sense,  the  highest 
faculties  of  man,  are  to  be  trusted,  then  war  is  the  wrong, 
the  falsehood,  the  lie.  I  maintain  that  aggressive  war  is  a 
sin  ;  that  it  is  national  infidelity,  a  denial  of  Christianity  and 
of  God.  Every  man  who  understands  Christianity  by  heart, 
in  its  relations  to  man,  to  society,  the  nation,  the  world, 
knows  that  war  is  a  wrong.  At  this  day,  with  all  the 
enlightenment  of  our  age,  after  the  long  peace  of  the 
nations,  war  is  easily  avoided.  Whenever  it  occurs,  the  very 
fact  of  its  occurrence  convicts  the  rulers  of  a  nation  either 
of  entire  incapacity  as  statesmen,  or  else  of  the  worst  form 
of  treason,  treason  to  the  people,  to  mankind,  to  God ! 
There  is  no  other  alternative.  The  very  fact  of  an  aggres- 
sive war  shows  that  the  men  who  cause  it  must  be  either 
fools  or  traitors.  I  think  lightly  of  what  is  called  treason 
against  a  government.  That  may  be  your  duty  to-day,  or 
mine.  Certainly  it  was  our  fathers'  duty  not  long  ago  ;  now 
it  is  our  boast  and  their  title  to  honor.  But  treason  against 
the  people,  against  mankind,  against  God,  is  a  great  sin,  not 
lightly  to  be  spoken  of.  The  political  authors  of  the  war 
on  this  continent,  and  at  this  day,  are  either  utterly  incapable 
of  a  statesman's  work,  or  else  guilty  of  that  sin.  Fools  they 
are,  or  traitors  they  must  be. 

Let  me  speak,  and  in  detail,  of  the  Evils  of  War.  I  wish 
this  were  not  necessary.  But  we  have  found  ourselves  in  a 
war ;  the  Congress  has  voted  our  money  and  our  men  to 
carry  it  on ;  the  Governors  call  for  volunteers ;  the  volun- 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  51 

teers  come  when  they  are  called  for.  No  voice  of  indigna- 
tion goes  forth  from  the  heart  of  the  eight  hundred  thousand 
souls  of  Massachusetts ;  of  the  seventeen  million  freemen 
of  the  land  how  few  complain ;  only  a  man  here  and  there ! 
The  Press  is  well-nigh  silent.  And  the  Church,  so  far  from 
protesting  against  this  infidelity  in  the  name  of  Christ,  is 
little  better  than  dead.  The  man  of  blood  shelters  himself 
behind  its  wall,  silent,  dark,  dead  and  emblematic.  These 
facts  show  that  it  is  necessary  to  speak  of  the  evils  of  war. 
I  am  speaking  in  a  city,  whose  fairest,  firmest,  most  costly 
buildings  are  warehouses  and  banks ;  a  city  whose  most 
popular  Idol  is  Mammon,  the  God  of  Gold  ;  whose  Trinity 
is  a  Trinity  of  Coin !  I  shall  speak  intelligibly,  therefore, 
if  I  begin  by  considering  war  as  a  waste  of  property. 
It  paralyzes  industry.  The  very  fear  of  it  is  a  mildew  upon 
commerce.  Though  the  present  war  is  but  a  skirmish, 
only  a  few  random  shots  between  a  squad  of  regulars  and 
some  strolling  battalions,  a  quarrel  which  in  Europe  would 
scarcely  frighten  even  the  Pope ;  yet  see  the  effect  of  it 
upon  trade.  Though  the  fighting  be  thousands  of  miles 
from  Boston,  your  stocks  fall  in  the  market ;  the  rate  of 
insurance  is  altered  ;  your  dealer  in  wood  piles  his  boards 
and  his  timber  on  his  wharf,  not  finding  a  market.  There 
are  few  ships  in  the  great  Southern  mart  to  take  the  freight 
of  many  ;  exchange  is  disturbed.  The  clergyman  is  afraid 
to  buy  a  book,  lest  his  children  want  bread.  It  so  is  with 
all  departments  of  industry  and  trade.  In  war  the  capitalist 
is  uncertain  and  slow  to  venture,  so  the  laborer's  hand  will 
be  still,  and  his  child  ill-clad  and  hungry. 

In  the  late  war  with  England,  many  of  you  remember 
the  Condition  of  your  fisheries,  of  your  commerce  ;  how  the 
ships  lay  rotting  at  the  wharf.  The  dearness  of  cloth,  of 
provisions,  flour,  sugar,  tea,  coffee,  salt,  the  comparative 
lowness  of  wages,  the  stagnation  of  business,  the  scarcity 
of  money,  the  universal  sullenness  and  gloom  —  all  this  is 
well  remembered  now.  So  is  the  ruin  it  brought  on  many 
a  man. 


52  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

Yet  but  few  weeks  ago  some  men  talked  boastingly  of  a 
war  with  England.  There  are  some  men  who  seem  to  have 
no  eyes  nor  ears,  only  a  mouth  ;  whose  chief  function  is 
talk.  Of  their  talk  I  will  say  nothing,  we  look  for  dust  in 
dry  places.  But  some  men  thus  talked  of  war,  and  seemed 
desirous  to  provoke  it,  who  can  scarce  plead  ignorance,  and 
I  fear  not  folly  for  their  excuse.  I  leave  such  to  the  just 
resentment  sure  to  fall  on  them  from  sober,  serious  men, 
who  dare  to  be  so  unpopular  as  to  think  before  they  speak, 
and  then  say  what  comes  of  thinking.  Perhaps  such  a  war 
was  never  likely  to  take  place,  and  now,  thanks  to  a  few 
wise  men,  all  danger  thereof  seems  at  an  end.  But  sup- 
pose it  had  happened  —  what  would  become  of  your  com- 
merce, of  your  fishing  smacks  on  the  Banks  or  along  the 
shore  ?  What  of  your  coasting  vessels,  doubling  the  head- 
lands all  the  way  from  the  St.  John's  to  the  Nueces  ?  what 
of  your  whale  ships  in  the  Pacific?  what  of  your  Indiamen, 
deep  freighted  with  oriental  wealth  ?  what  of  that  fleet 
which  crowds  across  the  Atlantic  sea,  trading  with  east  and 
west  and  north  and  south  ?  I  know  some  men  care  little 
for  the  rich,  but  when  the  owners  keep  their  craft  in  port, 
where  can  the  "  hands "  find  work  or  their  mouths  find 
bread?  The  shipping  of  the  United  States  amounts  nearly 
to  2,500,000  tons.  At  $40  a  ton,  its  value  is  nearly  8100,- 
000,000.  This  is  the  value  only  of  those  sea-carriages; 
their  cargoes  I  cannot  compute.  Allowing  one  sailor  for 
every  twenty  tons  burthen,  here  will  be  125,000  seamen. 
They  and  their  families  amount  to  500,000  souls.  In  war, 
what  will  become  of  them  ?  A  capital  of  more  than 
$13,000,000  is  invested  in  the  fisheries  of  Massachusetts 
alone.  More  than  19,000  men  find  profitable  employment 
therein.  If  each  man  have  but  four  others  in  his  family,  a 
small  number  for  that  class,  here  are  more  than  95,000 
persons  in  this  State  alone,  whose  daily  bread  depends  on 
this  business.  They  cannot  fish  in  troubled  waters,  for 
they  are  fishermen,  not  politicians.  Where  could  they  find 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  53 

bread  or  cloth  in  time  of  war?     In  Dartmoor  prison  ?     Ask 
that  of  your  demagogues  who  courted  war  ? 

Then,  too,  the  positive  destruction  of  property  in  war  is 
monstrous.  A  ship  of  the  line  costs  from  $500,000  to 
$1,000,000.  The  loss  of  a  fleet  by  capture,  by  fire,  or  by 
decay,  is  a  great  loss.  You  know  at  what  cost  a  fort  is 
built,  if  you  have  counted  the  sums  successively  voted  for 
Fort  Adams  in  Rhode  Island,  or  those  in  our  own  harbor. 
The  destruction  of  forts  is  another  item  in  the  cost  of  war. 
The  capture  or  destruction  of  merchant  ships  with  their 
freight,  creates  a  most  formidable  loss.  In  1812  the  whole 
tonnage  of  the  United  States  was  scarce  half  what  it  is  now. 
Yet  the  loss  of  ships  and  their  freight,  in  "  the  late  war," 
brief  as  it  was,  is  estimated  at  $100,000,000!  Then  the 
loss  by  plunder  and  military  occupation  is  monstrous.  The 
soldier,  like  the  savage,  cuts  down  the  tree  to  gather  its 
fruit.  I  cannot  calculate  the  loss  by  burning  towns  and 
cities.  But  suppose  Boston  were  bombarded  and  laid  in 
ashes.  Calculate  the  loss  if  you  can.  You  may  say 
"  This  could  not  be,"  for  it  is  easy  to  say  No,  as  Yes. 
But  remember  what  befell  us  in  the  last  war ;  remember 
how  recently  the  best  defended  capitals  of  Europe,  Vienna, 
Paris,  Antwerp,  have  fallen  into  hostile  hands.  Consider 
how  often  a  strong  place,  like  Coblentz,  Mentz,  Malta, 
Gibraltar,  St.  Juan  d'  Ulloa,  has  been  declared  impregnable, 
and  then  been  taken  ;  calculate  the  force  which  might  be 
brought  against  this  town,  and  you  will  see  that  in  eight 
and  forty  hours,  or  half  that  time,  it  might  be  left  nothing 
but  a  heap  of  ruins  smoking  in  the  sun !  I  doubt  not  the 
valor  of  American  soldiers,  the  skill  of  their  engineers,  nor 
the  ability  of  their  commanders.  I  am  ready  to  believe  all 
this  is  greater  than  we  are  told.  Still,  such  are  the  contin- 
gencies of  war.  If  some  not  very  ignorant  men  had  their 
way,  this  would  be  a  probability  and  perhaps  a  fact.  If  we 
should  burn  every  town  from  the  Tweed  to  the  Thames,  it 
would  not  re-build  our  own  city. 
5* 


54  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

But  on  the  supposition  that  nothing  is  destroyed,  see  the 
loss  which  comes  from  the  misdirection  of  productive  indus- 
try. Your  fleets,  forts,  dock-yards,  arsenals,  cannons,  mus- 
kets, swords  and  the  like,  are  provided  at  great  cost,  and 
yet  are  unprofitable.  They  do  not  pay.  They  weave  no 
cloth ;  they  bake  no  bread ;  they  produce  nothing.  Yet 
from  1791  to  1832,  in  forty-two  years,  we  expended  in 
these  things,  $303,242,576,  namely,  for  the  navy,  &c., 
$  1 12,703,933  ;  for  the  army,  &c.,  $190,538,643.  For  the 
same  time,  all  other  expenses  of  the  nation  came  to  but 
$37,158,047.  More  than  eight-ninths  of  the  whole  revenue 
of  the  nation  was  spent  for  purposes  of  war.  In  four  years, 
from  1812  to  1815,  we  paid  in  this  way,  $92,350,519.37. 
In  six  years,  from  1835  to  1840,  we  paid  annually  on  the 
average  $21,328,903  ;  in  all  $127,973,418.  Our  Congress 
has  just  voted  $17,000,000,  as  a  special  grant  for  the  army 
alone.  The  175,118  muskets  at  Springfield,  are  valued  at 
$3,000,000;  we  pay  annually  $200,000  to  support  that 
arsenal.  The  navy-yard  at  Charlestown,  with  its  stores, 
&c.,  has  cost  $4,741,000.  And,  for  all  profitable  returns, 
this  money  might  as  well  be  sunk  in  the  bottom  of  the  sea. 
In  some  countries  it  is  yet  worse.  There  are  towns  and 
cities  in  which  the  fortifications  have  cost  more  than  all  the 
houses,  churches,  shops  and  other  property  therein.  This 
happens  not  among  the  Sacs  and  Foxes,  but  in  "  Christian  " 
Europe. 

Then  your  soldier  is  the  most  unprofitable  animal  you 
can  keep.  He  makes  no  railroads  ;  clears  no  land  ;  raises 
no  corn.  No,  he  can  make  neither  cloth  nor  clocks  !  He 
does  not  raise  his  own  bread,  mend  his  own  shoes,  make  his 
shoulder-knot  of  glory,  nor  hammer  out  his  own  sword. 
Yet  he  is  a  costly  animal,  though  useless.  If  the  President 
gets  his  fifty  thousand  volunteers,  a  thing  likely  to  happen  — 
for  though  Irish  lumpers  and  hod-men  want  a  dollar  or  a 
dollar  and  a  half  a  day,  your  free  American  of  Boston  will 
enlist  for  twenty-seven  cents,  only  having  his  livery,  his 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  55 

feathers,  and  his  "  glory  "  thrown  in  —  then  at  88  a  month, 
their  wages  amount  to  $400,000  a  month.  Suppose  the 
present  Government  shall  actually  make  advantageous  con- 
tracts, and  the  subsistence  of  the  soldier  cost  no  more  than 
in  England,  or  $17  a  month,  this  amounts  to  $850,000. 
Here  are  81,250,000  a  month  to  begin  with.  Then,  if  each 
man  would  be  worth  a  dollar  a  day  at  any  productive 
work,  and  there  are  26  work  days  in  the  month,  here  are 
$1,300,000  more  to  be  added,  making  $2,550,000  a  montli 
for  the  new  army  of  occupation.  This  is  only  for  the  rank  and 
file  of  the  army.  The  officers,  the  surgeons,  and  the  chap- 
lains, who  teach  the  soldiers  to  wad  their  muskets  with  the 
leaves  of  the  Bible,  will  perhaps  cost  as  much  more  ;  or,  in 
all,  something  more  than  85,000,000  a  month.  This  of  course 
does  not  include  the  cost  of  their  arms,  tents,  ammunition, 
baggage,  horses  and  hospital  stores,  nor  the  65,000  gallons 
of  whiskey  which  the  Government  has  just  advertised  for ! 
What  do  they  give  in  return?  They  will  give  us  three 
things,  valor,  glory,  and — talk;  which,  as  they  are  not 
in  the  price  current,  I  must  estimate  as  I  can,  and  set 
them  all  down  in  one  figure  =  0 ;  not  worth  the  whiskey 
they  cost. 

New  England  is  quite  a  new  country.  Seven  generations 
ago  it  was  a  wilderness ;  now  it  contains  about  2,500,000 
souls.  If  you  were  to  pay  all  the  public  debts  of  these 
States,  and  then,  in  fancy,  divide  all  the  property  therein 
by  the  population,  young  as  we  are,  I  think  you  would  find 
a  larger  amount  of  value  for  each  man  than  in  any  other 
country  in  the  world,  not  excepting  England.  The  civiliza- 
tion of  Europe  is  old ;  the  nations  old,  England,  France, 
Spain,  Austria,  Italy,  Greece ;  but  they  have  wasted  their 
time,  their  labor  and  their  wealth  in  war,  and  so  are  poorer 
than  we  upstarts  of  a  wilderness.  We  have  fewer  fleets, 
forts,  cannon  and  soldiers  for  the  population,  than  any  other 
"Christian"  country  in  the  world.  This  is  one  main  rea- 
son why  we  have  no  national  debt ;  why  the  women  need 


56  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

not  toil  in  the  hardest  labor  of  the  fields,  the  quarries  and  the 
mines ;  this  is  the  reason  that  we  are  well  fed,  well  clad, 
well  housed  ;  this  is  the  reason  that  Massachusetts  can  afford 
to  spend  $1,000,000  a  year  for  her  public  schools  !  War, 
wasting  a  nation's  wealth,  depresses  the  great  mass  of  the 
people,  but  serves  to  elevate  a  few  to  opulence  and  power. 
Every  despotism  is  established  and  sustained  by  war.  This 
is  the  foundation  of  all  the  aristocracies  of  the  old  world, 
aristocracies  of  blood.  Our  famous  men  are  often  ashamed 
that  their  wealth  was  honestly  got  by  working,  or  peddling, 
and  foolishly  copy  the  savage  and  bloody  emblems  of  an- 
cient heraldry  in  their  assumed  coats  of  arms,  industrious 
men  seeking  to  have  a  griffin  on  their  seal !  Nothing  is  so 
hostile  to  a  true  democracy  as  war.  It  elevates  a  few, 
often  bold,  bad  men,  at  the  expense  of  the  many,  who  pay 
the  money  and  furnish  the  blood  for  war. 

War  is  a  most  expensive  folly.  The  revolutionary  war  cost 
the  General  Government  directly  and  in  specie  $  135,000,000. 
It  is  safe  to  estimate  the  direct  cost  to  the  individual  States 
also  at  the  same  sum,  $135,000,000;  making  a  total  of 
$270,000,000.  Considering  the  interruption  of  business, 
the  waste  of  time,  property  and  life,  it  is  plain  that  this 
could  not  have  been  a  fourth  part  of  the  whole.  But  sup- 
pose it  was  a  third,  then  the  whole  pecuniary  cost  of  the 
war  would  be  §810,000,000.  At  the  beginning  of  the  Revo- 
lution the  population  was  about  3,000,000  ;  so  that  war,  last- 
ing about  eight  years,  cost  $270  for  each  person.  To  meet 
the  expenses  of  the  war  each  year  there  would  have  been 
required  a  tax  of  $33.75  on  each  man,  woman  and  child  ! 

In  the  Florida  war  we  spent  between  $30,000,000  and 
$40,000,000,  as  an  eminent  statesman  once  said,  in  fighting 
five  hundred  invisible  Indians!  It  is  estimated  that  the  for- 
tifications of  the  city  of  Paris,  when  completely  furnished, 
will  cost  more  than  the  whole  taxable  property  of  Massa- 
chusetts, with  her  800,000  souls.  Why,  this  year  our  own 
grant  for  the  army  is  $17,000,000.  The  estimate  for  the 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  57 

navy  is  86,000,000  more ;  in  all  $23,000,000  more.  Sup- 
pose,  which  is  most  unlikely,  that  we  should  pay  no  more, 
why,  that  sum  alone  would  support  public  schools,  as  good 
and  as  costly  as  those  of  Massachusetts,  all  over  the  United 
States,  offering  each  boy  and  girl,  bond  or  free,  as  good 
a  culture  as  they  get  here  in  Boston,  and  then  leave  a 
balance  of  $3,000,000  in  our  hands !  We  pay  more  for 
ignorance  than  we  need  for  education !  But  $23,000,000 
is  not  all  we  must  pay  this  year.  A  great  statesman  has 
said,  in  the  Senate,  that  our  war  expenses  at  present  are 
nearly  $500,000  a  day,  and  the  President  informs  your 
Congress  that  $22,952,904  more  will  be  wanted  for  the 
army  and  navy  before  next  June  ! 

For  several  years  we  spent  directly  more  than  $21,000,000 
for  war  purposes,  though  in  time  of  peace.  If  a  railroad 
cost  $30,000  a  mile,  then  we  might  build  700  miles  a  year 
for  that  sum,  and  in  five  years  could  build  a  railroad  there- 
with from  Boston  to  the  further  side  of  Oregon.  For  the 
war  money  we  paid  in  forty-two  years,  we  could  have  had 
more  than  10,000  miles  of  railroad,  and,  with  dividends  at 
7  per  cent.,  a  yearly  income  of  $21,210,000.  For  military 
and  naval  affairs,  in  eight  years,  from  1835  to  1843,  we 
paid  $163,336,717.  This  alone  would  have  made  5,444 
miles  of  railroad,  and  would  produce,  at  7  per  cent.,  an  an- 
nual income  of  §11,433,569.19. 

In  Boston  there  are  nineteen  public  grammar  schools,  a 
Latin  and  English  High  school.  The  buildings  for  these 
schools,  twenty  in  number,  have  cost  $653,208.  There  are 
also  135  primary  schools,  in  as  many  houses  or  rooms.  I 
know  not  their  value,  as  I  think  they  are  not  all  owned  by 
the  city.  But  suppose  them  to  be  worth  $150,000.  Then 
all  the  school-houses  of  this  city  have  cost  $803,208.  The 
cost  of  these  156  schools  for  this  year  is  estimated  at 
$172,000.  The  number  of  scholars  in  them  is  16,479. 
Harvard  University,  the  most  expensive  college  in  America, 
costs  about  $46,000  a  year.  Now  the  ship  Ohio,  lying  here 


58  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

in  our  harbor,  has  cost  $834,845,  and  we  pay  for  it  each 
year  $220,000  more.  That  is,  it  has  cost  $31,637  more 
than  these  155  school-houses  of  this  city,  and  costs  every 
year  $2,000  more  than  Harvard  University,  and  all  the 
public  schools  of  Boston ! 

The  military  academy  at  West  Point  contains  two  hun- 
dred and  thirty-six  cadets  ;  the  appropriation  for  it  last  year 
was  $138,000,  a  sum  greater,  I  think,  than  the  cost  of  all 
the  colleges  in  Maine,  New  Hampshire,  Vermont  and  Mas- 
sachusetts, with  their  1,445  students. 

The  navy-yard  at  Charlestown,  with  its  ordnance,  stores, 
&c.,  cost  $4,741,000.  The  cost  of  the  78  churches  in  Bos- 
ton is  $3,246,500 ;  the  whole  property  of  Harvard  University 
is  $703,175 ;  the  155  school-houses  of  Boston  are  worth 
$803,208;  in  all  $4,752,883.  Thus  the  navy-yard  at 
Charlestown  has  cost  almost  as  much  as  the  78  churches 
and  the  155  school-houses  of  Boston,  with  Harvard  College, 
its  halls,  libraries,  all  its  wealth  thrown  in.  Yet  what  does 
it  teach? 

Our  country  is  singularly  destitute  of  public  libraries. 
You  must  go  across  the  ocean  to  read  the  history  of  the 
Church  or  State  ;  all  the  public  libraries  in  America  cannot 
furnish  the  books  referred  to  in  Gibbqn's  Rome,  or  Gieseler's 
History  of  the  Church.  I  think  there  is  no  public  library  in 
Europe  which  has  cost  three  dollars  a  volume.  There  are 
six:  the  Vatican,  at  Rome  ;  the  Royal,  at  Paris;  the  British 
Museum,  at  London ;  the  Bodleian,  at  Oxford ;  the  Univer- 
sity Libraries  at  Gottingen  and  Berlin  —  which  contain,  it 
is  said,  about  4,500,000  volumes.  The  recent  grant  of 
$17,000,000  for  the  army  is  $3,500,000  more  than  the  cost 
of  those  magnificent  collections  ! 

There  have  been  printed  about  3,000,000  different  vol- 
umes, great  and  little,  within  the  last  400  years.  If  the 
Florida  war  cost  but  $30,000,000,  it  is  ten  times  more  than 
enough  to  have  purchased  one  copy  of  each  book  ever 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  69 

printed,  at  one  dollar  a  volume,  which  is  more  than  the 
average  cost. 

Now  all  these  sums  are  to  be  paid  by  the  people,  "  the 
dear  people,"  whom  our  republican  demagogues  love  so 
well,  and  for  whom  they  spend  their  lives,  rising  early, 
toiling  late,  those  self-denying  heroes,  those  sainted  martyrs 
of  the  republic,  eating  the  bread  of  carefulness  for  them 
alone !  But  how  are  they  to  be  paid  ?  By  a  direct  tax  levied 
on  all'the  property  of  the  nation,  so  that  the  poor  man  pays 
according  to  his  little,  and  the  rich  man  in  proportion  to  his 
much,  each  knowing  when  he  pays  and  what  he  pays  for. 
No  such  thing;  nothing  like  it.  The  people  must  pay  and 
not  know  it ;  must  be  deceived  a  little,  or  they  would  not  pay 
after  this  fashion !  You  pay  for  it  in  every  pound  of  sugar, 
copper,  coal,  in  every  yard  of  cloth  ;  and  if  the  counsel  of 
some  lovers  of  the  people  be  followed,  you  will  soon  pay 
for  it  in  each  pound  of  coffee  and  tea.  In  this  way  the  rich 
man  always  pays  relatively  less  than  the  poor ;  often  a  posi- 
tively smaller  sum.  Even  here  I  think  that  three-fourths  of 
all  the  property  is  owned  by  one-fourth  of  the  people,  yet 
that  three-fourths  by  no  means  pays  a  third  of  the  national 
revenue.  The  tax  is  laid  on  things  men  cannot  do  without, 
—  sugar,  cloth,  and  the  like.  The  consumption  of  these 
articles  is  not  in  proportion  to  wealth  but  persons.  Now 
the  poor  man,  as  a  general  rule,  has  more  children  than  the 
rich,  and  the  tax  being  more  in  proportion  to  persons  than 
property,  the  poor  man  pays  more  than  the  rich.  So  a  tax 
is  really  laid  on  the  poor  man's  children  to  pay  for  the  war 
which  makes  him  poor  and  keeps  him  poor.  I  think  your 
captains  and  colonels,  those  sons  of  thunder  and  heirs  of 
glory,  will  not  tell  you  so.  They  tell  you  so  !  They  know 
it !  Poor  brothers,  how  could  they  ?  I  think  your  party 
newspapers,  penny  or  pound,  will  not  tell  you  so;  nor  the 
demagogues,  all  covered  with  glory  and  all  forlorn,  who 
tell  the  people  when  to  hurrah  and  for  what!  But  if  you 
cipher  the  matter  out  for  yourself  you  will  find  it  so,  and 


60  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

not  otherwise.  Tell  the  demagogues,  whig  or  democrat, 
that.  It  was  an  old  Roman  maxim,  "  The  people  wished  to 
be  deceived  ;  let  them."  Now  it  is  only  practised  on  ;  not 
repeated  —  in  public. 

Let  us  deal  justly  even  with  war,  giving  that  its  due. 
There  is  one  class  of  men  who  find  their  pecuniary  ad- 
vantage in  it.  I  mean  army  contractors,  when  they  chance 
to  be  favorites  of  the  party  in  power ;  men  who  let  steam- 
boats to  lie  idle  at  $500  a  day.  This  class  of  men  rejoice 
in  a  war.  The  country  may  become  poor,  they  are  sure  to 
be  rich.  Yet  another  class  turn  war  to  account,  get  the 
"  glory,"  and  become  important  in  song  and  sermon.  I  see 
it  stated  in  a  newspaper  that  the  Duke  of  Wellington  has 
received,  as  gratuities  for  his  military  services,  $5,400,000, 
and  $40,000  a  year  in  pensions ! 

But  the  waste  of  property  is  the  smallest  part  of  the  evil. 
The  waste  of  life  in  war  is  yet  more  terrible.  Human  life  is 
a  sacred  thing.  Go  out  into  the  lowest  street  of  Boston ; 
take  the  vilest  and  most  squalid  man  in  that  miserable  lane, 
and  he  is  dear  to  some  one.  He  is  called  brother ;  perhaps 
husband  ;  it  may  be  father ;  at  least,  son.  A  human  heart, 
sadly  joyful,  beat  over  him  before  he  was  born.  He  has 
been  pressed  fondly  to  his  mother's  arms.  Her  tears  and 
her  smiles  have  been  for  him ;  perhaps  also  her  prayers. 
His  blood  may  be  counted  mean  and  vile  by  the  great  men 
of  the  earth  who  love  nothing  so  well  as  the  dear  people,  for 
he  has  no  "  coat  of  arms,"  no  liveried  servant  to  attend  him, 
but  it  has  run  down  from  the  same  first  man.  His  family  is 
ancient  as  that  of  the  most  long  descended  king.  God  made 
him  ;  made  this  splendid  universe  to  wait  on  him  and  teach 
him  ;  sent  his  Christ  to  save  him.  He  is  an  immortal  soul. 
Needlessly  to  spill  that  man's  blood  is  an  awful  sin.  It  will 
cry  against  you  out  of  the  ground  —  Cain !  where  is  thy 
brother?  Now  in  war  you  bring  together  50,000  men  like 
him  on  one  side,  and  50,000  of  a  different  nation  on  the 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  61 

other.  They  have  no  natural  quarrel  with  one  another. 
The  earth  is  wide  enough  for  both  ;  neither  hinders  the  sun 
from  the  other.  Many  come  unwillingly  ;  many  not  know, 
ing  what  they  fight  for.  It  is  but  accident  that  determines 
on  which  side  the  man  shall  fight.  The  cannons  pour  their 
shot  —  round,  grape,  canister;  the  howitzers  scatter  their 
bursting  shells ;  the  muskets  rain  their  leaden  death  ;  the 
sword,  the  bayonet,  the  horses'  iron  hoof;  the  wheels  of  the 
artillery  grind  the  men  down  into  trodden  dust.  There  they 
lie,  the  two  masses  of  burning  valor,  extinguished,  quenched, 
and  grimly  dead,  each  covering  with  his  body  the  spot  he 
defended  with  his  arms.  They  had  no  quarrel ;  yet  they  lie 
there,  slain  by  a  brother's  hand.  It  is  not  old  and  decrepid 
men,  but  men  of  the  productive  age,  full  of  lusty  life. 

But  it  is  only  the  smallest  part  that  perish  in  battle. 
Exposure  to  cold,  wet,  heat ;  unhealthy  climates,  unwhole- 
some food,  rum  and  forced  marches,  bring  on  diseases  which 
mow  down  the  poor  soldiers  worse  than  musketry  and  grape. 
Others  languish  of  wounds,  and  slowly  procrastinate  a 
dreadful  and  a  ten-fold  death.  Far  away,  there  are  widows, 
orphans,  childless  old  fathers,  who  pore  over  the  daily  news 
to  learn  at  random  the  fate  of  a  son,  a  father,  or  a  husband  ! 
They  crowd  disconsolate  into  the  churches,  seeking  of  God 
the  comfort  men  took  from  them,  praying  in  the  bitterness 
of  a  broken  heart,  while  the  priest  gives  thanks  for  "  a 
famous  victory,"  and  hangs  up  the  bloody  standard  over 
his  pulpit ! 

When  ordinary  disease  cuts  off  a  man,  when  he  dies  at 
his  duty,  there  is  some  comfort  in  that  loss.  "  It  was  the 
ordinance  of  God,"  you  say.  You  minister  to  his  wants  ; 
you  smooth  down  the  pillow  for  the  aching  head ;  your  love 
beguiles  the  torment  of  disease,  and  your  own  bosom  gathers 
half  the  darts  of  death.  He  goes  in  his  time  and  God  takes 
him.  But  when  he  dies  in  such  a  war,  in  battle,  it  is  man 
who  has  robbed  him  of  life.  It  is  a  murderer  that  is  butch- 
ered. Nothing  alleviates  that  bitter,  burning  smart ! 
6 


62  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

Others  not  slain  are  maimed  for  life.  This  has  no  eyes  ; 
that  no  hands;  another  no  feet  nor  legs.  This  has  been 
pierced  by  lances,  and  torn  with  the  shot,  till  scarce  any 
tiling  human  is  left.  The  wreck  of  a  body  is  crazed  with 
pains  God  never  meant  for  man.  The  mother  that  bore  him 
would  not  know  her  child.  Count  the  orphan  asylums  in 
Germany  and  Holland  ;  go  into  the  hospital  at  Greenwich, 
that  of  the  invalids  at  Paris,  you  see  the  "  trophies "  of 
Napoleon  and  Wellington.  Go  to  the  arsenal  at  Toulon, 
see  the  wooden  legs  piled  up  there  for  men  now  active  and 
whole,  and  you  will  think  a  little  of  the  physical  horrors  of 
war. 

In  Boston  there  are  perhaps  about  25,000  able-bodied 
men  between  18  and  45.  Suppose  them  all  slain  in  battle, 
or  mortally  hurt,  or  mown  down  by  the  camp-fever,  vomito, 
or  other  diseases  of  war,  and  then  fancy  the  distress,  the 
heart-sickness  amid  wives,  mothers,  daughters,  sons  and 
fathers,  here  !  Yet  25,000  is  a  small  number  to  be  mur- 
dered in  "  a  famous  victory  ;  "  a  trifle  for  a  whole  "  glorious 
campaign "  in  a  great  war.  The  men  of  Boston  are  no 
better  loved  than  the  men  of  Tamaulipas.  There  is  scarce 
an  old  family,  of  the  middle  class,  in  all  New  England, 
which  did  not  thus  smart  in  the  Revolution ;  many,  which 
have  not,  to  this  day,  recovered  from  the  bloody  blow  then 
falling  on  them.  Think,  wives,  of  the  butchery  of  your 
husbands  ;  think,  mothers,  of  the  murder  of  your  sons  ! 

Here,  too,  the  burthen  of  battle  falls  mainly  on  the 
humble  class.  They  pay  the  great  tribute  of  money ;  they 
pay  also  the  horrid  tax  of  blood.  It  was  not  your  rich  men 
who  fought  even  the  Revolution ;  not  they.  Your  men  of 
property  and  standing  were  leaguing  with  the  British,  or 
fitting  out  privateers  when  that  offered  a  good  investment, 
or  buying  up  the  estates  of  more  consistent  tories  ;  making 
money  out  of  the  nation's  dire  distress !  True,  there  were 
most  honorable  exceptions ;  but  such,  I  think,  was  the 
general  rule.  Let  this  be  distinctly  remembered,  that  the 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  63 

burthen  of  battle  is  borne  by  the  humble  classes  of  men ; 
they  pay  the  vast  tribute  of  money  ;  the  awful  tax  of  blood  ! 
The  "  glory  "  is  got  by  a  few  ;  poverty,  wounds,  death,  are 
for  the  people ! 

Military  glory  is  the  poorest  kind  of  distinction,  but  the 
most  dangerous  passion.  It  is  an  honor  to  man  to  be  able 
to  mould  iron ;  to  be  skilful  at  working  in  cloth,  wood,  clay, 
leather.  It  is  man's  vocation  to  raise  corn,  to  subdue  the 
rebellious  fibre  of  cotton  and  convert  it  into  beautiful  robes, 
full  of  comfort  for  the  body.  They  are  the  heroes  of  the 
race  who  abridge  the  time  of  human  toil  and  multiply  its 
results  ;  they  who  win  great  truths  from  God,  and  send  them 
to  a  people's  heart ;  they  who  balance  the  many  and  the  one 
into  harmonious  action,  so  that  all  are  united  and  yet  each 
left  free.  But  the  glory  which  comes  of  epaulets  and 
feathers  ;  that  strutting  glory  which  is  dyed  in  blood  —  what 
shall  we  say  of  it  ?  In  this  day  it  is  not  heroism  ;  it  is  an 
imitation  of  barbarism  long  ago  passed  by.  Yet  it  is 
marvellous  how  many  men  are  taken  with  a  red  coat !  You 
expect  it  in  Europe,  a  land  of  soldiers  and  blood.  You  are 
disappointed  to  find  that  here  the  champions  of  force  should 
be  held  in  honor,  and  that  even  the  lowest  should  voluntarily 
enroll  themselves  as  butchers  of  men  ! 

Yet  more  :  aggressive  war  is  a  sin ;  a  corruption  of  the 
public  morals.  It  is  a  practical  denial  of  Christianity ;  a 
violation  of  God's  eternal  law  of  love.  This  is  so  plain  that 
I  shall  say  little  upon  it  to-day.  Your  savagest  and  most 
vulgar  captain  would  confess  he  does  not  fight  as  a  Christian 
—  but  as  a  soldier  ;  your  magistrate  calls  for  volunteers  — 
not  as  a  man  loving  Christianity,  and  loyal  to  God ;  only  as 
Governor,  under  oath  to  keep  the  Constitution,  the  tradition 
of  the  elders ;  not  under  oath  to  keep  the  commandment  of 
God !  In  war  the  laws  are  suspended,  violence  and  cunning 
rule  everywhere.  The  battle  of  Yorktown  was  gained  by  a 
lie,  though  a  Washington  told  it.  As  a  soldier  it  was  his 


64  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

duty.  Men  "emulate  the  tiger;"  the  hand  is  bloody,  and 
the  heart  hard.  Robbery  and  murder  are  the  rule,  the  glory 
of  men.  "  Good  men  look  sad,  but  ruffians  dance  and  leap." 
Men  are  systematically  trained  to  burn  towns,  to  murder 
fathers  and  sons ;  taught  to  consider  it  "  glory,"  to  do  so. 
The  Government  collects  ruffians  and  cut-throats.  It  com- 
pels better  men  to  serve  with  these  and  become  cut-throats. 
It  appoints  chaplains  to  blaspheme  Christianity  ;  teaching 
the  ruffians  how  to  pray  for  the  destruction  of  the  enemy, 
the  burning  of  his  towns ;  to  do  this  in  the  name  of  Christ 
and  God.  I  do  not  censure  all  the  men  who  serve  :  some  of 
them  know  no  better ;  they  have  heard  that  a  man  would 
"  perish  everlastingly  "  if  he  did  not  believe  the  Athanasian 
creed  ;  that  if  he  questioned  the  story  of  Jonah,  or  the 
miraculous  birth  of  Jesus,  he  was  in  danger  of  hell-fire,  and 
if  he  doubted  damnation  was  sure  to  be  damned.  They 
never  heard  that  such  a  war  was  a  sin ;  that  to  create  a  war 
was  treason,  and  to  fight  in  it  wrong.  They  never  thought 
of  thinking  for  themselves;  their  thinking  was  to  read  a 
newspaper,  or  sleep  through  a  sermon.  They  counted  it 
their  duty  to  obey  the  Government  without  thinking  if  that 
Government  be  right  or  wrong.  I  deny  not  the  noble,  manly 
character  of  many  a  soldier,  his  heroism,  self-denial  and 
personal  sacrifice. 

Still,  after  all  proper  allowance  is  made  for  a  few  indi- 
viduals, the  whole  system  of  war  is  unchristian  and  sinful. 
It  lives  only  by  evil  passions.  It  can  be  defended  only  by 
what  is  low,  selfish,  and  animal.  It  absorbs  the  scum  of 
the  cities,  pirates,  robbers,  murderers.  It  makes  them  worse, 
and  better  men  like  them.  To  take  one  man's  life  is  mur- 
der ;  what  is  it  to  practise  killing  as  an  art,  a  trade  ;  to  do 
it  by  thousands  ?  Yet  I  think  better  of  the  hands  that  do 
the  butchering  than  of  the  ambitious  heads,  the  cold,  re- 
morseless hearts,  which  plunge  the  nation  into  war. 

In  war  the  State  teaches  men  to  lie,  to  steal,  to  kill. 
It  calls  for  privateers,  who  are  commonly  pirates  with  a 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  65 

national  charter,  and  pirates  are  privateers  with  only  a 
personal  charter.  Every  camp  is  a  school  of  profanity, 
violence,  licentiousness,  and  crimes  too  foul  to  name.  It  is 
so  without  sixty-five  thousand  gallons  of  whiskey.  This  is 
unavoidable.  It  was  so  with  Washington's  army,  with 
Cornwallis's,  with  that  of  Gustavus  Adolphus,  perhaps  the 
most  moral  army  the  world  ever  saw.  The  soldier's  life 
generally  unfits  a  man  for  the  citizen's !  When  he  returns 
from  a  camp,  from  a  war,  back  to  his  native  village,  he 
becomes  a  curse  to  society  and  a  shame  to  the  mother  that 
bore  him.  Even  the.  soldiers  of  the  Revolution,  who  sur- 
vived the  war,  were  mostly  ruined  for  life,  debauched,  in- 
temperate, vicious  and  vile.  What  loathsome  creatures  so 
many  of  them  were  !  They  bore  our  burthen,  for  such 
were  the  real  martyrs  of  that  war,  not  the  men  who  fell 
under  the  shot !  How  many  men  of  the  rank  and  file  in 
the  late  war  have  since  become  respectable  citizens  ? 

To  show  how  incompatible  are  War  and  Christianity, 
suppose  that  he  who  is  deemed  the  most  Christian  of  Christ's 
disciples,  the  well-beloved  John,  were  made  a  navy-chap- 
lain, and  some  morning,  when  a  battle  is  daily  looked  for, 
should  stand  on  the  gun-deck,  amid  lockers  of  shot,  his 
Bible  resting  on  a  cannon,  and  expound  Christianity  to  men 
with  cutlasses  by  their  side  !  Let  him  read  for  the  morning 
lesson  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  and  for  text  take  words 
from  his  own  Epistle,  so  sweet,  so  beautiful,  so  true  :  "Ev- 
ery one  that  loveth  is  born  of  God,  and  knoweth  God,  for 
God  is  love."  Suppose  he  tells  his  strange  audience  that 
all  men  are  brothers ;  that  God  is  their  common  father ; 
that  Christ  loved  us  all,  showing. us  how  to  live  the  life  of 
love  ;  and  then,  when  he  had  melted  all  those  savage  hearts 
by  words  so  winsome  and  so  true,  let  him  conclude,  "  Bless- 
ed are  the  men-slayers  !  Seek  first  the  glory  which  cometh 
of  battle.  Be  fierce  as  tigers.  Mar  God's  image  in  which 
your  brothers  are  made.  Be  not  like  Christ,  but  Cain  who 
slew  his  brother!  When  you  meet  the  enemy,  fire  into 
6* 


66  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

their  bosoms  ;  kill  them  in  the  dear  name  of  Christ ;  butcher 
them  in  the  spirit  of  God.  Give  them  no  quarter,  for  we 
ought  not  to  lay  down  our  lives  for  the  brethren ;  only  the 
murderer  hath  eternal  life  !" 

Yet  great  as  are  these  three-fold  evils,  there  are  times 
when  the  soberest  men  and  the  best  men  have  welcomed  war, 
coolly  and  in  their  better  moments.  Sometimes  a  people, 
long  oppressed,  has  "  petitioned,  remonstrated,  cast  itself 
at  the  feet  of  the  throne,"  with  only  insult  for  answer  to  its 
prayer.  Sometimes  there  is  a  contest  between  a  falsehood 
and  a  great  truth ;  a  self-protecting  war  for  freedom  of 
mind,  heart  and  soul ;  yes,  a  war  for  a  man's  body,  his 
wife's  and  children's  body,  for  what  is  dearer  to  men  than 
life  itself,  for  the  unalienable  rights  of  man,  for  the  idea 
that  all  are  born  free  and  equal.  It  was  so  in  the  American 
Revolution ;  in  the  English,  in  the  French  Revolution.  In 
such  cases  men  say,  "  Let  it  come."  They  take  down  the 
firelock  in  sorrow ;  with  a  prayer  they  go  forth  to  battle, 
asking  that  the  Right  may  triumph.  Much  as  I  hate  war  I 
I  cannot  but  honor  such  men.  Were  they  better,  yet  more 
heroic,  even  war  of  that  character  might  be  avoided.  Still 
it  is  a  colder  heart  than  mine  which  does  not  honor  such 
men,  though  it  believes  them  mistaken.  Especially  do  we 
honor  them,  when  it  is  the  few,  the  scattered,  the  feeble, 
contending  with  the  many  and  the  mighty ;  the  noble  fight- 
ing for  a  great  idea,  and  against  the  base  and  tyrannical. 
Then  most  men  think  the  gain,  the  triumph  of  a  great  idea, 
is  worth  the  price  it  costs,  the  price  of  blood. 

I  will  not  stop  to  touch  that  question,  If  man  may  ever 
shed  the  blood  of  man.  But  it  is  plain  that  an  aggressive 
war  like  this  is  wholly  unchristian,  and  a  reproach  to  the 
nation  and  the  age. 

Now,  to  make  the  evils  of  war  still  clearer,  and  to  bring 
them  home  to  your  door,  let  us  suppose  there  was  war 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  67 

between  the  counties  of  Suffolk,  on  the  one  side,  and  Mid- 
dlesex on  the  other  —  this  army  at  Boston,  that  at  Cambridge. 
Suppose  the  subject  in  dispute  was  the  boundary  line  be- 
tween the  two,  Boston  claiming  a  pitiful  acre  of  flat  land, 
which  the  ocean  at  low  tide  disdained  to  cover.  To  make 
sure  of  this,  Boston  seizes  whole  miles  of  flats,  unquestion- 
ably not  its  own.  The  rulers  on  one  side  are  fools,  and 
traitors  on  the  other.  The  two  commanders  have  issued 
their  proclamations ;  the  money  is  borrowed ;  the  whiskey 
provided  ;  the  soldiers  —  Americans,  Negroes,  Irishmen,  all 
the  able-bodied  men  —  are  enlisted.  Prayers  are  offered  in 
all  the  churches,  and  sermons  preached,  showing  that  God 
is  a  man  of  war,  and  Cain  his  first  saint,  an  early  Christian, 
a  Christian  before  Christ.  The  Bostonians  wish  to  seize 
Cambridge,  burn  the  houses,  churches,  college-halls,  and 
plunder  the  library.  The  men  of  Cambridge  wish  to  seize 
Boston,  burn  its  houses  and  ships,  plundering  its  wares 
and  its  goods.  Martial  law  is  proclaimed  on  both  sides. 
The  men  of  Cambridge  cut  asunder  the  bridges,  and  make 
a  huge  breach  in  the  mill-dam,  planting  cannon  to  enfilade 
all  those  avenues.  Forts  crown  the  hill-tops,  else  so  green. 
Men,  madder  than  lunatics,  are  crowded  into  the  Asylum. 
The  Bostonians  rebuild  the  old  fortifications  on  the  Neck  ; 
replace  the  forts  on  Beacon-hill,  Fort-hill,  Copps-hill,  level- 
ing houses  to  make  room  for  redoubts  and  bastions.  The 
batteries  are  planted,  the  mortars  got  ready ;  the  furnaces 
and  magazines  are  all  prepared.  The  three  hills  are  grim 
with  war.  From  Copps-hill  men  look  anxious  to  that  mem- 
orable height  the  other  side  of  the  water.  Provisions  are 
cut  off  in  Boston  ;  no  man  may  pass  the  lines  ;  the  aqueduct 
refuses  its  genial  supply ;  children  cry  for  their  expected 
food.  The  soldiers  parade,  looking  somewhat  tremulous 
and  pale  ;  all  the  able-bodied  have  come,  the  vilest  most 
willingly  ;  some  are  brought  by  force  of  drink,  some  by 
force  of  arms.  Some  are  in  brilliant  dresses,  some  in  their 
working  frocks.  The  banners  are  consecrated  by  solemn^ 


68  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

words.*  Your  church-towers  are  military  posts  of  obser- 
vation. There  are  Old  Testament  prayers  to  the  "  God  of 
Hosts "  in  all  the  churches  of  Boston ;  prayers  that  God 
would  curse  the  men  of  Cambridge,  make  their  wives 
widows,  their  children  fatherless,  their  houses  a  ruin,  the 
men  corpses,  meat  for  the  beast  of  the  field  and  the  bird  of 
the  air.  Last  night  the  Bostonians  made  a  feint  of  attacking 
Charlestown,  raining  bombs  and  red-hot  cannon-balls  from 
Copps-hill,  till  they  have  burnt  a  thousand  houses,  where 
the  British  burnt  not  half  so  many.  Women  and  children 
fled  screaming  from  the  blazing  rafters  of  their  homes.  The 
men  of  Middlesex  crowd  into  Charlestown. 

In  the  meao  time  the  Bostonians  hastily  repair  a  bridge 
or  two  ;  some  pass  that  way,  some  over  the  Neck,  all 
stealthily  by  night,  and  while  the  foe  expect  them  at 
Bunker's,  amid  the  blazing  town,  they  have  stolen  a  march 
and  rush  upon  Cambridge  itself.  The  Cambridge  men  turn 
back.  The  battle  is  fiercely  joined.  You  hear  the  cannon, 
the  sharp  report  of  musketry.  You  crowd  the  hills,  the 
housetops ;  you  line  the  Common,  you  cover  the  shore, 
yet  you  see  but  little  in  the  sulphurous  cloud.  Now  the 
Bostonians  yield  a  little,  a  reinforcement  goes  over.  All 
the  men  are  gone ;  even  the  gray-headed  who  can  shoulder 
a  firelock.  They  plunge  into  battle  mad  with  rage,  madder 
with  rum.  The  chaplains  loiter  behind. 

"  Pious  men,  whom  duty  brought, 
To  dubious  verge  of  battle  fought, 
To  shrive  the  dying,  bless  the  dead !  " 

The  battle  hangs  long  in  even  scale.  At  length  it  turns. 
The  Cambridge  men  retreat,  they  run,  they  fly.  The 
houses  burn.  You  see  the  churches  and  the  colleges  go  up, 
a  stream  of  fire.  That  library  —  founded  amid  want  and 

*  See  the   appropriate   forms  of  prayer   for  that  service   by  the 
present  Bishop  of  Oxford,  in  Jay's  Address  before  the  American 
^Peace  Society,  in  1815. 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  69 

war  and  sad  sectarian  strife,  slowly  gathered  by  the  saving 
of  two  centuries,  the  hope  of  the  poor  scholar,  the  boast  of 
the  rich  one  —  is  scattered  to  the  winds  and  burnt  with  fire, 
for  the  solid  granite  is  blasted  by  powder,  and  the  turrets 
fall.  Victory  is  ours.  Ten  thousand  men  of  Cambridge 
lie  dead ;  eight  thousand  of  Boston.  There  writhe  the 
wounded  ;  men  who  but  few  hours  before  were  poured  over 
the  battle-field  a  lava  flood  of  fiery  valor  —  fathers,  brothers, 
husbands,  sons.  There  they  lie,  torn  and  mangled  ;  black 
with  powder  ;  red  with  blood  ;  parched  with  thirst ;  cursing 
the  load  of  life  they  now  must  bear  with  bruised  frames 
and  mutilated  limbs.  Gather  them  into  hasty  hospitals  — 
let  this  man's  daughter  come  to-morrow  and  sit  by  him, 
fanning  away  the  flies ;  he  shall  linger  out  a  life  of 
wretched  anguish  unspoken  and  unspeakable,  and  when 
he  dies  his  wife  religiously  will  keep  the  shot  which  tore 
his  limbs.  There  is  the  battle-field  !  Here  the  horse 
charged;  there  the  howitzers  scattered  their  shells,  preg- 
nant with  death  ;  here  the  murderous  canister  and  grape 
mowed  down  the  crowded  ranks  ;  there  the  huge  artillery, 
teeming  with  murder,  was  dragged  o'er  heaps  of  men  — 
wounded  friends  who  just  now  held  its  ropes,  men  yet 
curling  with  anguish,  like  worms  in  the  fire.  Hostile  and 
friendly,  head  and  trunk  are  crushed  beneath  those  dreadful 
wheels.  Here  the  infantry  showered  their  murdering  shot. 
That  ghastly  face  was  beautiful  the  day  before  —  a  sabre 
hewed  its  half  away. 

"  The  earth  is  covered  thick  with  other  clay, 
Which  her  own  clay  must  cover,  heaped  and  pent, 
Rider  and  horse,  friend,  foe,  in  one  red  burial  blent." 

Again  it  is  night.  Oh,  what  a  night,  and  after  what  a 
day !  Yet  the  pure  tide  of  woman's  love,  which  never 
ebbs  since  earth  began,  flows  on  in  spite  of  war  and  battle. 
Stealthily,  by  the  pale  moonlight,  a  mother  of  Boston  treads 
the  weary  miles  to  reach  that  bloody  spot ;  a  widow  she  — 
seeking  among  the  slain  her  only  son.  The  arm  of  power 


TO  SERMON    OP    WAR. 

drove  him  forth  reluctant  to  the  fight.  A  friendly  soldier 
guides  her  way.  Now  she  turns  over  this  face,  whose 
mouth  is  full  of  purple  dust,  bit  out  of  the  ground  in  his 
extremest  agony,  the  last  sacrament  offered  him  by  Earth 
herself;  now  she  raises  that  form,  cold,  stiff,  stony  and 
ghastly  as  a  dream  of  hell.  But,  lo !  another  comes,  she 
too  a  woman,  younger  and  fairer,  yet  not  less  bold,  a 
maiden  from  the  hostile  town  to  seek  her  lover.  They 
meet,  two  women  among  the  corpses ;  two  angels  come 
to  Golgotha,  seeking  to  raise  a  man.  There  he  lies  before 
them  ;  they  look.  Yes  it  is  he  you  seek ;  the  same  dress, 
form,  features  too ;  it  is  he,  the  son,  the  lover.  Maid  and 
mother  could  tell  that  face  in  any  light.  The  grass  is  wet 
with  his  blood.  The  ground  is  muddy  with  the  life  of  men. 
The  mother's  innocent  robe  is  drabbled  in  the  blood  her 
bosom  bore.  Their  kisses,  groans,  and  tears,  recall  the 
wounded  man.  He  knows  the  mother's  voice ;  that  voice 
yet  more  beloved.  His  lips  move  only,  for  they  cannot 
speak.  He  dies !  The  waxing  moon  moves  high  in 
heaven,  walking  in  beauty  amid  the  clouds,  and  murmurs 
soft  her  cradle  song  unto  the  slumbering  earth.  The 
broken  sword  reflects  her  placid  beams.  A  star  looks  down 
and  is  imaged  back  in  a  pool  of  blood.  The  cool  night 
wind  plays  in  the  branches  of  the  trees  shivered  with  shot. 
Nature  is  beautiful  —  that  lovely  grass  underneath  their 
feet ;  those  pendulous  branches  of  the  leafy  elm  ;  the  stars 
and  that  romantic  moon  lining  the  clouds  with  silver  light! 
A  groan  of  agony,  hopeless  and  prolonged,  wails  out  from 
that  bloody  ground.  But  in  yonder  farm  the  whippoorwill 
sings  to  her  lover  all  night  long  ;  the  rising  tide  ripples 
melodious  against  the  shores.  So  wears  the  night  away,  — 
Nature,  all  sinless,  round  that  field  of  wo. 

"  The  morn  is  up  again,  the  dewy  morn, 
With  breath  all  incense  and  with  cheek  all  bloom, 
Laughing  the  clouds  away  with  playful  scorn, 
And  living  as  if  earth  contained  no  tomb, 
And  glowing  into  day." 


-  SERMON    OP    WAR.  7 1 

What  a  scene  that  morning  looks  upon !  I  will  not  turn 
again.  Let  the  dead  bury  their  dead.  But  their  blood 
cries  out  of  the  ground  against  the  rulers  who  shed  it, — 
"  Cain !  where  are  thy  brothers  ? "  What  shall  the  fool 
answer  ;  what  the  traitor  say  ? 

Then  comes  thanksgiving  in  all  the  churches  of  Boston. 
The  consecrated  banners,  stiff  with  blood  and  "  glory,"  are 
hung  over  the  altar.  The  minister  preaches  and  the  singer 
sings  :  "  The  Lord  hath  been  on  our  side.  He  treadeth  the 
people  under  me.  He  teacheth  my  hands  to  war,  my 
fingers  to  fight.  Yea,  He  giveth  me  the  necks  of  mine 
enemies  ;  for  the  Lord  is  his  name  "  ;  and  "  It  was  a  famous 
victory !  "  Boston  seizes  miles  square  of  land ;  but  her 
houses  are  empty ;  her  wives  widows  ;  her  children  father- 
less. Rachel  weeps  for  the  murder  of  her  innocents,  yet 
dares  not  rebuke  the  rod. 

I  know  there  is  no  fighting  across  Charles  River,  as  in 
this  poor  fiction  ;  but  there  was  once,  and  instead  of 
Charles  say  Rio  Grande ;  for  Cambridge  read  Meta- 
moras,  and  it  is  what  your  President  recommended  ;  what 
your  Congress  enacted  ;  what  your  Governor  issued  his 
proclamation  for ;  what  your  volunteers  go  to  accomplish  : 
yes,  what  they  fired  cannon  for  on  Boston  Common  the 
other  day.  I  wish  that  were  a  fiction  of  mine  ! 

We  are  waging  a  most  iniquitous  war  —  so  it  seems  to 
me.  I  know  I  may  be  wrong,  but  I  am  no  partizan,  and  if 
I  err,  it  is  not  wilfully,  not  rashly.  I  know  the  Mexicans 
are  a  wretched  people ;  wretched  in  their  origin,  history, 
and  character.  I  know  but  two  good  things  of  them  as  a 
people  —  they  abolished  negro  slavery,  not  long  ago  ;  they 
do  not  covet  the  lands  of  their  neighbors.  True,  they  have 
not  paid  all  their  debts,  but  it  is  scarcely  decent  in  a  nation, 
with  any  repudiating  States,  to  throw  the  first  stone  at 
Mexico  for  that ! 

I  know  the  Mexicans  cannot  stand  before  this  terrible 


72  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

Anglo-Saxon  race,  the  most  formidable  and  powerful  the 
world  ever  saw  ;  a  race  which  has  never  turned  back  ; 
which,  though  it  number  less  than  forty  millions,  yet  holds 
the  Indies,  almost  the  whole  of  North  America ;  which 
rules  the  commerce  of  the  world ;  clutches  at  New  Hol- 
land, China,  New  Zealand,  Borneo,  and  seizes  island  after 
island  in  the  furthest  seas  ;  the  race  which  invented  steam 
as  its  awful  type.  The  poor,  wretched  Mexicans  can  never 
stand  before  us.  How  they  perished  in  battle  !  They  must 
melt  away  as  the  Indians  before  the  white  man.  Consider- 
ing how  we  acquired  Louisiana,  Florida,  Oregon,  I  cannot 
forbear  thinking  that  this  people  will  possess  the  whole  of 
the  continent  before  many  years  ;  perhaps  before  the  cen- 
tury ends.  But  this  may  be  had  fairly  ;  with  no  injustice  to 
any  one  ;  by  the  steady  advance  of  a  superior  race,  with 
superior  ideas  and  a  better  civilization  ;  by  commerce, 
trade,  arts,  by  being  better  than  Mexico,  wiser,  humaner, 
more  free  and  manly.  Is  it  not  better  to  acquire  it  by  the 
school-master  than  the  cannon  ;  by  peddling  cloth,  tin,  any 
thing  rather  than  bullets  ?  It  may  not  all  belong  to  this 
Government,  and  yet  to  this  race.  It  would  be  a  gain  to 
mankind  if  we  could  spread  over  that  country  the  Idea  of 
America  —  that  all  men  are  born  free  and  equal  in  rights, 
and  establish  there  political,  social,  and  individual  freedom. 
But  to  do  that,  we  must  first  make  real  these  ideas  at 
home. 

In  the  general  issue  between  this  race  and  that,  we  are 
in  the  right.  But  in  this  special  issue,  and  this  particular 
war,  it  seems  to  me  that  we  are  wholly  in  the  wrong ;  that 
our  invasion  of  Mexico  is  as  bad  as  the  partition  of  Poland 
in  the  last  century  and  in  this.  If  I  understand  the  matter, 
the  whole  movement,  the  settlement  of  Texas,  the  Texan 
revolution,  the  annexation  of  Texas,  the  invasion  of  Mexico, 
has  been  a  movement  hostile  to  the  American  idea,  a 
movement  to  extend  slavery.  I  do  not  say  such  was  the 
design  on  the  part  of  the  people,  but  on  the  part  of  the 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  73 

politicians  who  pulled  the  strings.  I  think  the  papers  of  the 
Government  and  the  debates  of  Congress  prove  that.  The 
annexation  has  been  declared  unconstitutional  in  its  mode, 
a  virtual  dissolution  of  the  Union,  and  that  by  very  high  and 
well  known  authority.  It  was  expressly  brought  about  for  the 
purpose  of  extending  slavery.  An  attempt  is  now  made  to 
throw  the  shame  of  this  on  the  democrats.  I  think  the 
democrats  deserve  the  shame  ;  but  I  could  never  see  that 
the  whigs,  on  the  whole,  deserved  it  any  less;  only  they 
were  not  quite  so  open.  Certainly,  their  leaders  did  not 
take  ground  against  it,  never  as  against  a  modification  of 
the  tariff!  When  we  annexed  Texas  we  of  course  took  her 
for  better  or  worse,  debts  and  all,  and  annexed  her  war 
along  with  her.  I  take  it  everybody  knew  that;  though 
now  some  seem  to  pretend  a  decent  astonishment  at  the 
result.  Now  one  party  is  ready  to  fight  for  it  as  the  other ! 
The  North  did  not  oppose  the  annexation  of  Texas.  Why 
not?  They  knew  they  could  make  money  by  it.  The 
eyes  of  the  North  are  full  of  cotton ;  they  see  nothing  else, 
for  a  web  is  before  them ;  their  ears  are  full  of  cotton,  and 
they  hear  nothing  but  the  buzz  of  their  mills ;  their  mouth 
is  full  of  cotton,  and  they  can  speak  audibly  but  two  words 
—  Tariff,  Tariff,  Dividends,  Dividends.  The  talent  of  the 
North  is  blinded,  deafened,  gagged  with  its  own  cotton. 
The  North  clamored  loudly  when  the  nation's  treasure  was 
removed  from  the  United  States  Bank  ;  it  is  almost  silent  at 
the  annexation  of  a  slave  territory  big  as  the  kingdom  of 
France,  encumbered  with  debts,  loaded  with  the  entailment 
of  war !  Northern  Governors  call  for  soldiers  ;  our  men 
volunteer  to  fight  in  a  most  infamous  war  for  the  extension 
of  slavery !  Tell  it  not  in  Boston,  whisper  it  not  in  Faneuil 
Hall,  lest  you  waken  the  slumbers  of  your  fathers,  and  they 
curse  you  as  cowards  and  traitors  unto  men  !  Not  satisfied 
with  annexing  Texas  and  a  war,  we  next  invaded  a  territory 
which  did  not  belong  to  Texas,  and  built  a  fort  on  the 
7 


74  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

Rio  Grande,  where,  I  take  it,  we  had  no  more  right  than 
the  British,  in  1841,  had  on  the  Penobscot  or  the  Saco. 
Now  the  Government  and  its  Congress  would  throw  the 
blame  on  the  innocent,  and  say  war  exists  "  by  the  act  of 
Mexico ! "  If  a  lie  was  ever  told,  I  think  this  is  one. 
Then  the  "  dear  people  "  must  be  called  on  for  money  and 
men,  for  "  the  soil  of  this  free  republic  is  invaded,"  and 
the  Governor  of  Massachusetts,  one  of  the  men  who 
declared  the  annexation  of  Texas  unconstitutional,  recom- 
mends the  war  he  just  now  told  us  to  pray  against,  and 
appeals  to  our  "  patriotism,"  and  "  humanity,"  as  arguments 
for  butchering  the  Mexicans,  when  they  are  in  the  right  and 
we  in  the  wrong !  The  maxim  is  held  up,  "  Our  country, 
right  or  wrong  ;  "  "  Our  country,  howsoever  bounded  ;  " 
and  it  might  as  well  be,  "  Our  country,  howsoever  gov- 
erned." It  seems  popularly  and  politically  forgotten  that 
there  is  such  a  thing  as  Right.  The  nation's  neck  invites 
a  tyrant.  I  am  not  at  all  astonished  that  northern  repre- 
sentatives voted  for  all  this  work  of  crime.  They  are  no 
better  than  southern  representatives ;  scarcely  less  in  favor 
of  slavery,  and  not  half  so  open.  They  say  :  Let  the 
North  make  money,  and  you  may  do  wjiat  you  please  with 
the  nation  ;  and  we  will  choose  governors  that  dare  not 
oppose  you,  for,  though  we  are  descended  from  the  Puritans 
we  have  but  one  article  in  our  creed,  we  never  flinch  from 
following,  and  that  is  —  to  make  money;  honestly,  if  we 
can  ;  if  not,  as  we  can  ! 

Look  through  the  action  of  your  Government,  and  your 
Congress.  You  see  that  no  reference  has  been  had  in  this 
affair  to  Christian  ideas  ;  none  to  justice  and  the  eternal 
right.  Nay,  none  at  all !  In  the  churches,  and  among  the 
people,  how  feeble  has  been  the  protest  against  this  great 
wrong.  How  tamely  the  people  yield  their  necks  —  and 
say  :  "  Take  onr  sons  for  the  war  —  we  care  not,  right  or 
wrong."  England  butchers  the  Sikhs  in  India  —  her  gen- 
erals are  elevated  to  the  peerage,  and  the  head  of  her 


SERMON    OF  WAR.  /  ;> 

church  writes  a  form  of  thanksgiving  for  the  victory,  to  be 
read  in  all  the  churches  of  that  Christian  land.  *     To  make 


*Form  of  Prayer  and  Thanksgiving  to  Almighty  God. 

"  O  Lord  God  of  Hosts,  in  whose  hand  is  power  and  might  irre- 
sistible, we,  thine  unworthy  servants,  most  humbly  acknowledge  thy 
goodness  in  the  victories  lately  vouchsafed  to  the  armies  of  our  Sove- 
reign over  a  host  of  barbarous  invaders,  who  sought  to  spread  des- 
olation over  fruitful  and  populous  provinces,  enjoying  the  blessings 
of  peace,  under  the  protection  of  the  British  Crown.  We  bless  Thee, 
O  merciful  Lord,  for  having  brought  to  a  speedy  and  prosperous 
issue  a  war  to  which  no  occasion  had  been  given  by  injustice  on  our 
part,  or  apprehension  of  injury  at  our  hands!  To  Thee,  0  Lord, 
we  ascribe  the  glory  !  It  was  Thy  wisdom  which  guided  the  counsel ! 
Thy  power  which  strengthened  the  hands  of  those  whom  it  pleased 
Thee  to  use  as  Thy  instruments  in  the  discomfiture  of  the  lawless 
aggressor,  and  the  frustration  of  his  ambitious  designs  !  From 
Thee,  alone,  cometh  the  victory,  and  the  spirit  of  moderation  and 
mercy  in  the  day  of  success.  Continue,  we  beseech  Thee,  to  go 
forth  with  our  armies,  whensoever  they  are  called  into  battle  in  a 
righteous  cause  ;  and  dispose  the  hearts  of  their  leaders  to  exact 
nothing  more  from  the  vanquished  than  is  necessary  for  the  main- 
tenance of  peace  and  security  against  violence  and  rapine. 

"  Above  all,  give  Thy  grace  to  those  who  preside  in  the  councils 
of  our  Sovereign,  and  administer  the  concerns  of  her  widely 
extended  dominions,  that  they  may  apply  all  their  endeavors  to  the 
purposes  designed  by  Thy  good  Providence,  in  committing  such 
power  to  their  hands,  the  temporal  and  spiritual  benefit  of  the 
nations  intrusted  to  their  care. 

"  And  whilst  Thou  preserves!  our  distant  possessions  from  the 
horrors  of  war,  give  us  peace  and  plenty  at  home,  that  the  earth 
may  yield  her  increase,  and  that  we,  Thy  servants,  receiving  Thy 
blessings  with  thankfulness  and  gladness  of  heart,  may  dwell 
together  in  unity,  and  faithfully  serve  Thee,  to  Thy  honor  and  glory, 
through  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord,  to  whom,  with  Thee  and  the  Holy 
Ghost,  belong  all  dominion  and  power,  both  in  heaven  and  earth, 
now  and  for  ever.  Amen."  —  See  a  defence  of  this  prayer,  in  the 
London  "  Christian  Observer  "  for  May,  p.  319,  et  seq.,  and  for  June, 
p.  346,  et  seq. 

Would  you  know  what  he  gave  thanks  for  on  Easter  Sunday? 
Here  is  the  history  of  the  battle  : 

"  This  battle  had  begun  at  six,  and  was  over  at  eleven  o'clock ; 


76  SERTWON    OF    WAR. 

it  still  more  abominable,  the  blasphemy  is  enacted  on  Easter 
Sunday,  the  great  holiday  of  men  who  serve  the  Prince  of 
Peace.  We  have  not  had  prayers  in  the  churches,  for  we 
have  no  political  Archbishop.  But  we  fired  cannon  in  joy 
that  we  had  butchered  a  few  wretched  men  —  half  starved, 
and  forced  into  the  ranks  by  fear  of  death !  Your  peace- 
societies,  and  your  churches,  what  can  they  do  ?  What  dare 
they  ?  Verily,  we  are  a  faithless  and  perverse  generation. 
God  be  merciful  to  us,  sinners  as  we  are  ! 

But  why  talk  for  ever  ?  What  shall  we  do  ?  In  regard 
to  this  present  war,  we  can  refuse  to  take  any  part  in  it ;  we 
can  encourage  others  to  do  the  same  ;  we  can  aid  men,  if 
need  be,  who  suffer  because  they  refuse.  Men  will  call  us 
traitors  :  what  then  ?  That  hurt  nobody  in  '76  !  We  are  a 
rebellious  nation  ;  our  whole  history  is  treason  ;  our  blood 
was  attainted  before  we  were  born  ;  our  creeds  are  infidelity 
to  the  mother-church  ;  our  Constitution  treason  to  our  father- 
land. What  of  that?  Though  all  the  governors  in  the 
world  bid  us  commit  treason  against  man,  and  set  the  exam- 
ple, let  us  never  submit.  Let  God  only  be  a  master  to 
control  our  conscience  ! 

We  can  hold  public  meetings  in  favor  of  peace,  in  which 
what  is  wrong  shall  be  exposed  and  condemned.  It  is  proof 
of  our  cowardice  that  this  has  not  been  done  before  now. 
We  can  show  in  what  the  infamy  of  a  nation  consists  ;  in 
what  its  real  glory.  One  of  your  own  men,  the  last  summer, 
startled  the  churches  out  of  their  sleep,*  by  his  manly 

the  hand-to-hand  combat  commenced  at  nine,  and  lasted  scarcely  two 
hours.  The  river  was  full  of  sinking  men.  For  two  hours,  volley 
after  volley  was  poured  in  upon  the  human  mass —  the  stream  being 
literally  red  with  blood,  and  covered  with  the  bodies  of  the  slain.  At 
last,  the  musket  ammunition  becoming  exhausted,  the  infantry  fell 
to  the  rear,  the  horse  artillery  plying  grape  till  not  a  man  was  visible 
•within  range.  No  compassion  was  felt  or  mercy  shown."  But 
"  'twas  a  famous  victory !  " 
*  Mr.  Charles  Sumner. 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  77 

trumpet,  talking  with  us,  and  telling  that  the  true  grandeur 
of  a  nation  was  justice,  not  glory,  peace,  not  war. 

We  can  work  now  for  future  times,  by  taking  pains  to 
spread  abroad  the  sentiments  of  peace,  the  ideas  of  peace, 
among  the  people  in  schools,  churches  —  everywhere.  At 
length  we  can  diminish  the  power  of  the  national  Govern- 
ment, so  that  the  people  alone  sh,all  have  the  power  to 
declare  war,  by  a  direct  vote,  the  Congress  only  to  recom- 
mend it.  We  can  take  from  the  Government  the  means  of 
war  by  raising  only  revenue  enough  for  the  nation's  actual 
wants,  and  raising  that  directly,  so  that  each  man  knows 
what  he  pays,  and  when  he  pays  it,  and  then  he  will  take 
care  that  it  is  not  paid  to  make  him  poor  and  keep  him  so. 
We  can  diffuse  a  real  practical  Christianity  among  the 
people,  till  the  mass  of  men  have  courage  enough  to  over- 
come evil  with  good,  and  look  at  aggressive  war  as  the  worst 
of  treason  and  the  foulest  infidelity ! 

Now  is  the  time  to  push  and  be  active.  War  itself  gives 
weight  to  words  of  peace.  There  will  never  be  a  better 
time  till  we  make  the  times  better.  It  is  not  a  day  for 
cowardice,  but  for  heroism.  Fear  not  that  the  "  honor  of 
the  nation"  will  suffer  from  Christian  movements  for  peace. 
What  if  your  men  of  low  degree  are  a  vanity,  and  your 
men  of  high  degree  are  a  lie?  That  is  no  new  thing.  Let 
true  men  do  their  duty,  and  the  lie  and  the  vanity  will  pass 
each  to  its  reward.  Wait  not  for  the  churches  to  move,  or 
the  State  to  become  Christian.  Let  us  bear  our  testimony 
like  men,  not  fearing  to  be  called  traitors,  infidels ;  fearing 
only  to  be  such. 

I  would  call  on  Americans,  by  their  love  of  our  country, 
its  great  ideas,  its  real  grandeur,  its  hopes,  and  the  memory 
of  its  fathers  —  to  come  and  help  save  that  country  from 
infamy  and  ruin.  I  would  call  on  Christians,  who  believe 
that  Christianity  is  a  truth,  to  lift  up  their  voice,  public  and 
private,  against  the  foulest  violation  of  God's  law,  this 
blasphemy  of  the  Holy  Spirit  of  Christ,  this  worst  form  of 
7* 


78  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

infidplity  to  man  and  God.  I  would  call  on  all  men,  by  the 
one  nature  that  is  in  you,  by  the  great  human  heart  beating 
alike  in  all  your  bosoms,  to  protest  manfully  against  this 
desecration  of  the  earth,  this  high  treason  against  both  man 
and  God.  Teach  your  rulers  that  you  are  Americans,  not 
slaves ;  Christians,  not  heathen ;  men,  not  murderers,  to 
kill  for  hire !  You  may  effect  little  in  this  generation,  for 
its  head  seems  crazed  and  its  heart  rotten.  But  there  will 
be  a  day  after  to-day.  It  is  for  you  and  me  to  make  it 
better ;  a  day  of  peace,  when  nation  shall  no  longer  lift  up 
sword  against  nation ;  when  all  shall  indeed  be  brothers, 
and  all  blest.  Do  this,  you  shall  be  worthy  to  dwell  in 
this  beautiful  land ;  Christ  will  be  near  you  ;  God  work  with 
you,  and  bless  you  for  ever ! 

This  present  trouble  with  Mexico  may  be  very  brief; 
surely  it  might  be  even  now  brought  to  an  end  with  no 
unusual  manhood  in  your  rulers.  Can  we  say  we  have  not 
deserved  it  ?  Let  it  end,  but  let  us  remember  that  war, 
horrid  as  it  is,  is  not  the  worst  calamity  which  ever  befalls  a 
people.  It  is  far  worse  for  a  people  to  lose  all  reverence 
for  right,  for  truth,  all  respect  for  man  and  God ;  to  care 
more  for  the  freedom  of  trade  than  the  freedom  of  men ; 
more  for  a  tariff  than  millions  of  souls.  This  calamity 
came  upon  us  gradually,  long  before  the  present  war,  and 
will  last  long  after  that  has  died  away.  Like  people  like 
ruler,  is  a  true  word.  Look  at  your  rulers,  representatives, 
and  see  our  own  likeness  !  We  reverence  force,  and  have 
forgot  there  is  any  right  beyond  the  vote  of  a  Congress  or  a 
people ;  any  good  beside  dollars ;  any  God  but  majorities 
and  force.  I  think  the  present  war,  though  it  should  cost 
50,000  men  and  $50,000,000,  the  smallest  part  of  our 
misfortune.  Abroad  we  are  looked  on  as  a  nation  of  swind- 
lers and  men-stealers  !  What  can  we  say  in  our  defence  ? 
Alas,  the  nation  is  a  traitor  to  its  great  idea,  —  that  all  men 
are  born  equal,  each  with  the  same  unalienable  rights.  We 


SERMON    OF    WAR.  79 

are  infidels  to  Christianity.  We  have  paid  the  price  of  our 
shame. 

There  have  been  dark  days  in  this  nation  before  now.  It 
was  gloomy  when  Washington  with  his  little  army  fled 
through  the  Jerseys.  It  was  a  long  dark  day  from  '83  to  '89. 
It  was  not  so  dark  as  now ;  the  nation  never  so  false.  There 
was  never  a  time  when  resistance  to  tyrants  was  so  rare  a 
virtue  ;  when  the  people  so  tamely  submitted  to  a  wrong. 
Now  you  can  feel  the  darkness.  The  sack  of  this  city  and 
the  butchery  of  its  people  were  a  far  less  evil  than  the  moral 
deadness  of  the  nation.  Men  spring  up  again  like  the 
mown  grass ;  but  to  raise  up  saints  and  heroes  in  a  dead 
nation  corrupting  beside  its  golden  tomb,  what  shall  do  that 
for  us  ?  We  must  look  not  to  the  many  for  that,  but  to  the 
few  who  are  faithful  unto  God  and  man. 

I  know  the  hardy  vigor  of  our  men,  the  stalwart  intellect 
of  this  people.  Would  to  God  they  could  learn  to  love  the 
right  and  true.  Then  what  a  people  should  we  be,  spread- 
ing from  the  Madawaska  to  the  Sacramento,  diffusing  our 
great  idea,  and  living  our  religion,  the  Christianity  of 
Christ!  Oh,  Lord!  make  the  vision  true;  waken  thy 
prophets  and  stir  thy  people  till  righteousness  exalt  us  !  No 
wonders  will  be  wrought  for  that.  But  the  voice  of  con- 
science speaks  to  you  and  me,  and  all  of  us  :  The  right  shall 
prosper ;  the  wicked  States  shall  die,  and  history  responds 
her  long  amen. 

What  lessons  come  to  us  from  the  past !  The  Genius  of 
the  old  civilization,  solemn  and  sad,  sits  there  on  the  Alps, 
his  classic  beard  descending  o'er  his  breast.  Behind  him 
arise  the  new  nations,  bustling  with  romantic  life.  He 
bends  down  over  the  midland  sea,  and  counts  up  his  chil- 
dren —  Assyria,  Egypt,  Tyre,  Carthage,  Troy,  Etruria, 
Corinth,  Athens,  Rome  —  once  so  renowned,  now  gathered 
with  the  dead,  their  giant  ghosts  still  lingering  pensive  o'er 
the  spot.  He  turns  westward  his  face,  too  sad  to  weep,  and 
raising  from  his  palsied  knee  his  trembling  hand,  looks  on 


CU  SERMON    OF    WAR. 

his  brother  genius  of  the  new  civilization.  That  young 
giant,  strong  and  mocking,  sits  there  on  the  Alleghanies. 
Before  him  lie  the  waters,  covered  with  ships ;  behind  him 
he  hears  the  roar  of  the  Mississippi  and  the  far  distant  Ore- 
gon—  rolling  their  riches  to  the  sea.  He  bends  down,  and 
that  far  ocean  murmurs  pacific  in'  his  ear.  On  his  left,  are 
the  harbors,  shops  and  mills  of  the  East,  and  a  five-fold 
gleam  of  light  goes  up  from  Northern  lakes.  On  his  right, 
spread  out  the  broad  savannahs  of  the  South,  waiting  to  be 
blessed ;  and  far  off*  that  Mexique  bay  bends  round  her 
tropic  shores.  A  crown  of  stars  is  on  that  giant's  head, 
some  glorious  with  flashing,  many-colored  light ;  some  bloody 
red  ;  some  pale  and  faint,  of  most  uncertain  hue.  His  right 
hand  lies  folded  in  his  robe  ;  the  left  rests  on  the  Bible's 
opened  page,  and  holds  these  sacred  words  —  All  men  are 
equal,  born  with  equal  rights  from  God.  The  old  says  to 
the  young  :  "  Brother  beware  ! "  and  Alps  and  Rocky 
Mountains  say  "  Beware  !  "  That  stripling  giant,  ill-bred 
and  scoffing,  shouts  amain :  "  My  feet  are  red  with  the  In- 
dians' blood  ;  my  hand  has  forged  the  negro's  chain.  I  am 
strong  ;  who  dares  assail  me  ?  I  will  drink  his  blood,  for  I 
have  made  my  covenant  of  lies,  and  leagued  with  hell  for 
my  support.  There  is  no  right,  no  truth ;  Christianity  is 
false,  and  God  a  name."  His  left  hand  rends  those  sacred 
scrolls,  casting  his  Bibles  underneath  his  feet,  and  in  his 
right  he  brandishes  the  negro-driver's  whip,  crying  again  — 
"  Say,  who  is  God  and  what  is  Right."  And  all  his  moun- 
tains echo  —  Right.  But  the  old  genius  sadly  says  again: 
"Though  hand  join  in  hand,  the  wicked  shall  not  prosper." 
The  hollow  tomb  of  Egypt,  Athens,  Rome,  of  every  ancient 
State,  with  all  their  wandering  ghosts,  replies,  "AMEN." 


IV. 


SPEECH    DELIVERED   AT  THE  ANTI-WAR  MEETING  IN  FANEUIL  HALL, 
FEBRUARY  4th,   1847. 


ME.  CHAIRMAN,  —  We  have  come  here  to  consult  for  tho 
honor  of  our  country.  The  honor  and  dignity  of  the  United 
States  are  in  danger.  I  love  my  country  ;  I  love  her  honor. 
It  is  dear  to  me  almost  as  my  own.  I  have  seen  stormy 
meetings  in  Faneuil  Hall  before  now,  and  am  not  easily 
disturbed  by  a  popular  tumult.  But  never  before  did  I  see 
a  body  of  armed  soldiers  attempting  to  overawe  the  majesty 
of  the  people,  when  met  to  deliberate  on  the  people's  affairs. 
Yet  the  meetings  of  the  people  of  Boston  have  been  dis- 
turbed by  soldiers  before  now,  by  British  bayonets ;  but 
never  since  the  Boston  massacre  on  the  5th  of  March,  1770  ! 
Our  fathers  hated  a  standing  army.  This  is  a  new  one, 
but  behold  the  effect!  Here  are  soldiers  with  bayonets,  to 
overawe  the  majesty  of  the  people !  They  went  to  our 
meeting  last  Monday  night,  the  hireling  soldiers  of  President 
Polk,  to  overawe  and  disturb  the  meetings  of  honest  men. 
Here  they  are  now,  and  in  arms  ! 

We  are  in  a  war ;  the  signs  of  war  are  seen  here  in 
Boston.  Men,  needed  to  hew  wood  and  honestly  serve 
society,  are  marching  about  your  streets  ;  they  are  learning 
to  kill  men,  men  who  never  harmed  us,  nor  them  ;  learning 
to  kill  their  brothers.  It  is  a  mean  and  infamous  war  we  are 


82  SPEECH    AT    FANEUIL    HALL. 

fighting.  It  is  a  great  boy  fighting  a  little  one,  and  that 
little  one  feeble  and  sick.  What  makes  it  worse  is,  the 
little  boy  is  in  the  right,  and  the  big  boy  is  in  the  wrong,  and 
tells  solemn  lies  to  make  his  side  seem  right.  He  wants, 
besides,  to  make  the  small  boy  pay  the  expenses  of  the 
quarrel. 

The  friends  of  the  war  say  "  Mexico  has  invaded  our 
territory !  "  When  it  is  shown  that  it  is  we  who  have 
invaded  hers,  then  it  is  said,  "  Ay,  but  she  owes  us  money." 
Better  say  outright,  "  Mexico  has  land,  and  we  want  to 
steal  it ! " 

This  war  is  waged  for  a  mean  and  infamous  purpose,  for 
the  extension  of  slavery.  It  is  not  enough  that  there  are 
fifteen  Slave  States,  and  3,000,000  men  here  who  have  no 
legal  rights  —  not  so  much  as  the  horse  and  the  ox  have  in 
Boston :  it  is  not  enough  that  the  slaveholders  annexed 
Texas,  and  made  slavery  perpetual  therein,  extending  even 
north  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line,  covering  a  territory  forty- 
five  times  as  large  as  the  State  of  Massachusetts.  Oh,  no ; 
we  must  have  yet  more  land  to  whip  negroes  in ! 

The  war  had  a  mean  and  infamous  beginning.  It  began 
illegally,  unconstitutionally.  The  Whigs  say,  "  the  Presi- 
dent made  the  war."  Mr.  Webster  says  so !  It  went  on 
meanly  and  infamously.  Your  Congress  lied  about  it.  Do 
not  lay  the  blame  on  the  democrats ;  the  whigs  lied  just  as 
badly.  Your  Congress  has  seldom  been  so  single-mouthed 
before.  Why,  only  sixteen  voted  against  the  war,  or  the 
lie.  I  say  this  war  is  mean  and  infamous  all  the  more, 
because  waged  by  a  people  calling  itself  democratic  and 
Christian.  I  know  but  one  war  so  bad  in  modern  times, 
between  civilized  nations,  and  that  was  the  war  for  the 
partition  of  Poland.  Even  for  that  there  was  more  excuse. 

We  have  come  to  Faneuil  Hall  to  talk  about  the  war;  to 
work  against  the  war.  It  is  rather  late,  but  "  better  late 
than  never."  We  have  let  two  opportunities  for  work  pass 
unemployed.  One  came  while  the  annexation  of  Texas 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  83 

was  pending.  Then  was  the  time  to  push  and  be  active. 
Then  was  the  time  for  Massachusetts  and  all  the  North,  to 
protest  as  one  man  against  the  extension  of  slavery.  Every- 
body knew  all  about  the  matter,  the  democrats  and  the 
whigs.  But  how  few  worked  against  that  gross  mischief! 
One  noble  man  lifted  up  his  warning  voice  ;  *  a  man  noble 
in  his  father,  —  and  there  he  stands  in  marble;  noble  in 
himself — and  there  he  stands  yet  higher  up  —  and  I  hope 
time  will  show  him  yet  nobler  in  his  son,  and  there  he  stands, 
not  in  marble,  but  in  man !  He  talked  against  it,  worked 
against  it,  fought  against  it.  But  Massachusetts  did  little. 
Her  tonguey  men  said  little  ;  her  handy-men  did  little.  Too 
little  could  not  be  done  or  said.  True,  we  came  here  to 
Faneuil  Hall  and  passed  resolutions ;  good  resolutions  they 
were,  too.  Daniel  Webster  wrote  them,  it  is  said.  They 
did  the  same  in  the  State  House  ;  but  nothing  came  of  them. 
They  say  "  Hell  is  paved  with  resolutions  ;  "  these  were  of 
that  sort  of  resolutions  ;  which  resolve  nothing  because  they 
are  of  words,  not  works  ! 

Well,  we  passed  the  resolutions ;  you  know  who  opposed 
them ;  who  hung  back  and  did  nothing,  nothing  good  I 
mean ;  quite  enough  not  good.  Then  we  thought  all  the 
danger  was  over ;  that  the  resolutions  settled  the  matter. 
But  then  was  the  time  to  confound  at  once  the  enemies  of 
your  country ;  to  show  an  even  front  hostile  to  slavery. 

But  the  chosen  time  passed  over,  and  nothing  was  done. 
Do  not  lay  the  blame  on  the  democrats ;  a  whig  Senate 
annexed  Texas,  and  so  annexed  a  war.  We  ought  to  have 
told  our  delegation  in  Congress,  if  Texas  were  annexed,  to 
come  home,  and  we  would  breathe  upon  it  and  sleep  upon 
it,  ,and  then  see  what  to  do  next.  Had  our  resolutions, 
taken  so  warmly  here  in  Faneuil  Hall  in  1845,  been  but  as 
warmly  worked  out,  we  had  now  been  as  terrible  to  the 

*  John  Quincy  Adams.  ^ 


84  SPEECH    AT    FANEUIL    HALL. 

slave  power  as  the  slave  power,  since  extended,  now  is  to 
us  ! 

Why  was  it  that  we  did  nothing  ?  That  is  a  public 
secret.  Perhaps  I  ought  not  to  tell  it  to  the  people.  (Cries 
of  "  Tell  it.") 

The  annexation  of  Texas,  a  slave  territory  big  as  the 
kingdom  of  France,  would  not  furl  a  sail  on  the  ocean ; 
would  not  stop  a  mill-wheel  at  Lowell !  Men  thought  so. 

That  time  passed  by,  and  there  came  another.  The 
Government  had  made  war ;  the  Congress  voted  the  dollars, 
voted  the  men,  voted  a  lie.  Your  representative,  men  of 
Boston,  voted  for  all  three  ;  the  lie,  the  dollars,  and  the 
men ;  all  three,  in  obedience  to  the  slave  power !  Let  him 
excuse  that  to  the  conscience  of  his  party ;  it  is  an  easy 
matter.  I  -do  not  believe  he  can  excuse  it  to  his  own  con- 
science. jTp  the  conscience  of  the  world  it  admits  of  no 
excuse./  Your  President  called  for  volunteers,  50,000  of 
themT^Then  came  an  opportunity  such  as  offers  not  once 
in  one  hundred  years,  an  opportunity  to  speak  for  freedom 
and  the  rights  of  mankind !  Then  was  the  time  for  Massa- 
chusetts to  stand  up  in  the  spirit  of  '76,  and  say,  "  We 
won't  send  a  man,  from-  Cape  Ann  to  Williamstown  —  not 
one  Yankee  man,  for  this  wicked  war."  Then  was  the 
time  for  your  Governor  to  say,  "  Not  a  volunteer  for  this 
wicked  war."  Then  was  the  time  for  your  merchants  to 
say,  "  Not  a  ship,  not  a  dollar  for  this  wicked  war ; "  for 
your  manufacturers  to  say,  "  We  will  not  make  you  a 
cannon,  nor  a  sword,  nor  a  kernel  of  powder,  nor  a  soldier's 
shirt,  for  this  wicked  war."  Then  was  the  time  for  all  good 
men  to  say,  "  This  is  a  war  for  slavery,  a  mean  and  in- 
famous war  ;  an  aristocratic  war,  a  war  against  the  best 
interests  of  mankind.  If  God  please,  we  will  die  a  thousand 
times,  but  never  draw  blade  in  this  wicked  war.'^  (Cries  of 
"Throw  him  over,"  &c.)  Throw  him  over,  what  good 
would  that  do  ?  What  would  you  do  next,  after  you  have 
thrown  him  over?  ("  Drag  you  out  of  the  hall!  ")  What 


THE    MEXICAN    \VAll.  85 

good  would  that  do  ?  [_  It  would  not  wipe  olF  the  infamy  of 
this  war!  would  not  make  it  less  wicked  ! 

That  is  what  a  democratic  nation,  a  Christian  people 
ought  to  have  said,  ought  to  have  done.  But  we  did  not 
say  so  ;  the  Bay  State  did  not  say  so,  nor  your  Governor,  nor 
your  merchants,  nor  your  manufacturers,  nor  your  good 
men  ;  the  Governor  accepted  the  President's  decree,  issued 
his  proclamation  calling  for  soldiers,  recommended  men  to 
enlist,  appealing  to  their  "  patriotism  "  and  u  humanity." 

Governor  Briggs  is  a  good  man,  and  so  far  I  honor  him. 
He  is  a  temperance  man,  strong  and  consistent;  I  honor  him 
for  that.  He  is  a  friend  of  education ;  a  friend  of  the 
people.  I  wish  there  were  more  such.  Like  many  other 
New  England  men,  he  started  from  humble  beginnings  ;  but 
unlike  many  such  successful  men  of  New  England,  he  is 
not  ashamed  of  the  lowest  round  he  ever  trod  on.  I  honor 
him  for  all  this.  But  that  was  a  time  which  tried  men's  souls, 
and  his  soul  could  not  stand  the  rack.  I  am  sorry  for  him. 
He  did  as  the  President  told  him. 

What  was  the  reason  for  all  this  ?  Massachusetts  did  not 
like  the  war,  even  then  ;  yet  she  gave  her  consent  to  it. 
Why  so  ?  There  are  two  w6"rds  which  can  drive  the  blood  out 
of  the  cheeks  of  cowardly  men  in  Massachusetts  any  time. 
They  are  "  Federalism  "  and  "  Hartford  Convention  !  "  The 
fear  of  those  words  palsied  the  conscience  of  Massachusetts, 
and  so  her  Governor  did  as  he  was  told.  I  feel  no  fear  of 
either.  The  Federalists  did  not  see  all  things  ;  who  ever  did  ? 
They  had  not  the  ideas  which  were  destined  to  rule  this 
nation  ;  they  looked  back  when  the  age  looked  forward.  But 
to  their  own  ideas  they  were  true  ;  and  if  ever  a  nobler  body 
of  men  held  state  in  any  nation,  I  have  yet  to  learn  when  or 
where.  If  we  had  had  the  shadow  of  Caleb  Strong  in  the 
Governor's  chair,  not  a  volunteer  for  this  war  had  gone  out 
of  Massachusetts. 

I  have  not  told  quite  all  the  reasons  why  Massachusetts  did 
nothing.  Men  knew  the  war  would  cost  money  ;  that  the  dol- 
8 


86  SPEECH    AT    FANEUIL    HALL. 

lars  would  in  the  end  be  raised,  not  by  a  direct  tax,  of  which 
the  poor  man  paid  according  to  his  little,  and  the  rich  man  in 
proportion  to  his  much,  but  by  a  tariff  which  presses  light  on 
property,  and  hard  on  the  person  ;  by  a  tax  on  the  backs 
and  mouths  of  the  people.  Some  of  the  whigs  were  glad 
last  Spring,  when  the  war  came,  for  they  hoped  thereby  to 
save  the  child  of  their  old  age,  the  tariff  of  '42.  There 
are  always  some  rich  men,  who  say  "  No  matter  what  sort 
of  a  Government  we  have,  so  long  as  we  get  our  dividends ; " 
always  some  poor  men,  who  say  "  No  matter  how  much  the 
nation  suffers,  if  we  fill  our  hungry  purses  thereby."  Well, 
they  lost  their  virtue,  lost  their  tariff,  and  gained  just  nothing ; 
what  they  deserved  to  gain. 

Now  a  third  opportunity  has  come  ;  no,  it  has  not  come ; 
we  have  brought  it.  The  President  wants  a  war  tax  on  tea 
and  coffee.  Is  that  democratic,  to  tax  every  man's  breakfast 
and  supper,  for  the  sake  of  getting  more  territory  to  whip 
negroes  in  ?  (Numerous  cries  of  "  Yes.")  Then  what 
do  you  think  despotism  would  be  ?  He  asks  a  loan  of 
$28,000,000  for  this  war.  He  wants  §3,000,000  to  spend 
privately  for  this  war.  In  eight  months  past,  he  has  asked 
I  am  told  for  $74,000,000.  Seventy-four  millions  of  dollars 
to  conquer  slave  territory !  Is  that  democratic  too  ?  He 
wants  to  increase  the  standing  army,  to  have  ten  regiments 
more  !  A  pretty  business  that.  Ten  regiments  to  gag  the 
people  in  Faneuil  Hall.  Do  you  think  that  is  democratic  ? 
Some  men  have  just  asked  Massachusetts  for  $20,000  for 
the  volunteers !  It  is  time  for  the  people  to  rebuke  all  this 
wickedness. 

I  think  there  is  a  good  deal  to  excuse  the  volunteers.  I 
blame  them,  for  some  of  them  know  what  they  are  about. 
Yet  I  pity  them  more,  for  most  of  them,  I  am  told,  are  low, 
ignorant  men ;  some  of  them  drunken  and  brutal.  From 
the  uproar  they  make  here  to-night,  arms  in  their  hands,  I 
think  what  was  told  me  is  true  !  I  say  I  pity  them !  They 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  87 

are  my  brothers ;  not  the  less  brothers  because  low  and 
misguided.  If  they  are  so  needy  that  they  are  forced  to 
enlist  by  poverty,  surely  I  pity  them.  If  they  are  of  good 
families,  and  know  better,  I  pity  them  still  more  !  I  blame 
most  the  men  that  have  duped  the  rank  and  file !  I  blame 
the  captains  and  colonels,  who  will  have  least  of  the  hard-, 
ships,  most  of  the  pay,  and  all  of  the  "  glory."  I  blame 
the  men  that  made  the  war  ;  the  men  that  make  money  out 
of  it.  I  blame  the  great  party  men  of  the  land.  Did  not 
Mr.  Clay  say  he  hoped  he  could  slay  a  Mexican  ?  (Cries, 
"  No,  he  didn't.")  Yes,  he  did  ;  said  it  on  Forefather's 
day !  Did  not  Mr.  Webster,  in  the  streets  of  Philadelphia, 
bid  the  volunteers,  misguided  young  men,  go  and  uphold 
the  stars  of  their  country  ?  (Voices,  "  He  did  right ! ") 
No,  he  should  have  said  the  stripes  of  his  country,  for  every 
volunteer  to  this  wicked  war  is  a  stripe  on  the  nation's  back ! 
Did  not  he  declare  this  war  unconstitutional,  and  threaten  to 
impeach  the  President  who  made  it,  and  then  go  and  invest 
a  son  in  it  ?  Has  it  not  been  said  here,  "  Our  country,  how- 
soever bounded,"  bounded  by  robbery  or  bounded  by  right 
lines  !  Has  it  not  been  said,  all  round,  "  Our  country,  right 
or  wrong ! " 

I  say  I  blame  not  so  much  the  volunteers  as  the  famous 
men  who  deceive  the  nation  !  (Cries  of  "  Throw  him  over, 
kill  him,  kill  him,"  and  a  flourish  of  bayonets.)  Throw  him 
over  !  you  will  not  throw  him  over.  Kill  him  !  I  shall  walk 
home  unarmed  and  unattended,  and  not  a  man  of  you  will 
hurt  one  hair  of  my  head. 

I  say  again,  it  is  time  for  the  people  to  take  up  this  matter. 
Your  Congress  will  do  nothing  till  you  tell  them  what  and 
how  !  Your  29th  Congress  can  do  little  good.  Its  sands 
are  nearly  run,  God  be  thanked  !  It  is  the  most  infamous 
Congress  we  ever  had.  We  began  with  the  Congress  that 
declared  Independence,  and  swore  by  the  Eternal  Justice  of 
God.  We  have  come  down  to  the  29th  Congress,  which 
declared  war  existed  by  the  act  of  Mexico,  declared  a  lie ; 


88  SPEECH    AT    FANEUIL    HALL. 

the  Congress  that  swore  by  the  Baltimore  Convention  !  We 
began  with  George  Washington,  and  have  got  down  to 
James  K.  Polk. 

It  is  time  for  the  people  of  Massachusetts  to  instruct  their 
servants  in  Congress  to  oppose  this  war ;  to  refuse  all 
supplies  for  it ;  to  ask  for  the  recall  of  the  army  into  our 
own  land.  It  is  time  for  us  to  tell  them  that  not  an  inch  of 
slave  territory  shall  ever  be  added  to  the  realm.  Let  us 
remonstrate  ;  let  us  petition  ;  let  us  command.  If  any  class 
of  men  have  hitherto  been  remiss,  let  them  come  forward 
now  and  give  us  their  names  —  the  merchants,  the  manu- 
facturers, the  whigs  and  the  democrats.  If  men  love  their 
country  better  than  their  party  or  their  purse,  now  let  them 
show  it. 

Let  us  ask  the  General  Court  of  Massachusetts  to  cancel 
every  commission  which  the  Governor  has  given  to  the 
officers  of  the  volunteers.  Let  us  ask  them  to  disband  the 
companies  not  yet  mustered  into  actual  service  ;  and  then, 
if  you  like  that,  ask  them  to  call  a  convention  of  the  people 
of  Massachusetts,  to  see  what  we  shall  do  in  reference  to 
the  war  ;  in  reference  to  the  annexation  of  more  territory ; 
in  reference  to  the  violation  of  the  Constitution  !  (Loud 
groans  from  crowds  of  rude  fellows  in  several  parts  of  the 
hall.)  That  was  a  tory  groan  ;  they  never  dared  groan  so 
in  Faneuil  Hall  before  ;  not  even  the  British  tories,  when 
they  had  no  bayonets  to  back  them  up !  I  say,  let  us  ask 
for  these  things ! 

Your  President  tells  us  it  is  treason  to  talk  so !  Treason 
is  it?  treason  to  discuss  a  war  which  the  government  made, 
and  which  the  people  are  made  to  pay  for  ?  If  it  be  treason 
to  speak  against  the  war,  what  was  it  to  make  the  war,  to 
ask  for  50,000  men  and  874,000,000  for  the  war  ?  Why, 
if  the  people  cannot  discuss  the  war  they  have  got  to  fight 
and  to  pay  for,  who  under  heaven  can  ?  Whose  business  is 
it,  if  it  is  not  yours  and  mine  ?  If  my  country  is  in  the 
wrong,  and  I  know  it,  and  hold  my  peace,  then  I  am  guilty 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  89 

of  treason,  moral  treason.  Why,  a  wrong,  —  it  is  only  the 
threshold  of  ruin.  I  would  not  have  my  country  take  the 
next  step.  Treason  is  it,  to  show  that  this  war  is  wrong  and 
wicked  !  Why,  what  if  George  III.,  any  time  from  '75  to 
'83,  had  gone  down  to  Parliament  and  told  them  it  was 
treason  to  discuss  the  war  then  waging  against  these  colonies ! 
What  do  you  think  the  Commons  would  have  said  ?  What 
would  the  Lords  say  ?  Why,  that  King,  foolish  as  he  was, 
would  have  been  lucky,  if  he  had  not  learned  there  was  a 
joint  in  his  neck,  and,  stiff  as  he  bore  him,  that  the  people 
knew  how  to  find  it. 

I  do  not  believe  in  killing  kings,  or  any  other  men  ;  but  I 
do  say,  in  a  time  when  the  nation  was  not  in  danger,  that  no 
British  king,  for  two  hundred  years  past,  would  have  dared 
call  it  treason  to  discuss  the  war —  its  cause,  its  progress,  or 
its  termination ! 

Now  is  the  time  to  act !  Twice  we  have  let  the  occasion 
slip  ;  beware  of  the  third  time  !  Let  it  be  infamous  for  a 
New-England  man  to  enlist ;  for  a  New-England  merchant 
to  loan  his  dollars,  or  to  let  his  ships  in  aid  of  this  wicked 
war;  let  it  be  infamous  for  a  manufacturer  to  make  a  cannon, 
a  sword,  or  a  kernel  of  powder,  to  kill  our  brothers  with, 
while  we  all  know  that  they  are  in  the  right,  and  we  in  the 
wrong. 

I  know  my  voice  is  a  feeble  one  in  Massachusetts.  I 
have  no  mountainous  position  from  whence  to  look  down 
and  overawe  the  multitude ;  I  have  no  back-ground  of 
political  reputation  to  echo  my  words ;  I  am  but  a  plain 
humble  man  ;  but  I  have  a  back-ground  of  Truth  to  sustain 
me,  and  the  Justice  of  Heaven  arches  over  my  head  !  For 
your  sakes,  I  wish  I  had  that  oceanic  eloquence  whose  tidal 
flow  should  bear  on  its  bosom  the  drift-weed  which  politicians 
have  piled  together,  and  sap  and  sweep  away  the  sand 
hillocks  of  soldiery  blown  together  by  the  idle  wind ;  that 
oceanic  eloquence  which  sweeps  all  before  it,  and  leaves  the 
shore  hard,  smooth  and  clean  !  But  feeble  as  I  am,  let  me 
8* 


90  SPEECH    AT    FANEUIL    HALL. 

beg  of  you,  fellow-citizens  of  Boston,  men  and  brothers,  to 
come  forward  and  protest  against  this  wicked  war,  and  the 
end  for  which  it  is  waged.  I  call  on  the  whigs,  who  love 
their  country  better  than  they  love  the  tariff  of  '42  ;  I  call  on 
the  democrats,  who  think  Justice  is  greater  than  the  Balti- 
more Convention,  —  I  call  on  the  whigs  and  democrats  to 
come  forward  and  join  with  me,  in  opposing  this  wicked 
war !  I  call  on  the  men  of  Boston,  on  the  men  of  the  old 
Bay  State,  to  act  worthy  of  their  fathers,  worthy  of  their 
country,  worthy  of  themselves !  Men  and  brothers,  I  call 
on  you  all  to  protest  against  this  most  infamous  war,  in  the 
name  of  the  State,  in  the  name  of  the  country,  in  the  name 
of  rnan,  yes,  in  the  name  of  God  !  Leave  not  your  children 
saddled  with  a  war  debt,  to  cripple  the  nation's  commerce 
for  years  to  come.  Leave  not  your  land  cursed  with  slavery, 
extended  and  extending,  palsying  the  nation's  arm  and 
corrupting  the  nation's  heart.  Leave  not  your  memory 
infamous  among  the  nations,  because  you  feared  men,  feared 
the  Government ;  because  you  loved  money  got  by  crime, 
land  plundered  in  war,  loved  land  unjustly  bounded  ;  because 
you  debased  your  country  by  defending  the  wrong  she  dared 
to  do  ;  because  you  loved  slavery  ;  loved  war,  but  loved  not 
the  Eternal  Justice  of  all-judging  God.  If  my  counsel  is 
weak  and  poor,  follow  one  stronger  and  more  manly.  I  am 
speaking  to  men ;  think  of  these  things,  and  then  act  like 
men. 


V. 


A  SERMON   OP  THE    MEXICAN  WAB.— PREACHED    AT   TUB  MELODEON, 
ON    SUNDAY,  JUNE  «5th,    1848. 


SOON  after  the  commencement  of  the  war  against  Mexico, 
I  said  something  respecting  it  in  this  place.  But  while  I 
was  printing  the  sermon,  I  was  advised  to  hasten  the  com- 
positors in  their  work,  or  the  war  would  be  over  before  the 
sermon  was  out.  The  advice  was  like  a  good  deal  of  the 
counsel  that  is  given  a  man  who  thinks  for  himself,  and 
honestly  speaks  what  he  unavoidably  thinks.  It  is  now 
more  than  two  years  since  the  war  began ;  I  have  hoped  to 
live  long  enough  to  see  it  ended,  and  hoped  to  say  a  word 
about  it  when  over.  A  month  ago,  this  day,  the  25th  of 
May,  the  treaty  of  peace,  so  much  talked  of,  was  ratified 
by  the  Mexican  Congress.  A  few  days  ago,  it  was  officially 
announced  by  telegraph  to  your  collector  in  Boston,  that 
the  war  with  Mexico  was  at  an  end. 

There  are  two  things  about  this  war  quite  remarkable. 
The  first  is,  the  manner  of  its  commencement.  It  was 
begun  illegally,  without  the  action  of  the  constitutional 
authorities ;  begun  by  the  command  of  the  President  of  the 
United  States,  who  ordered  the  American  army  into  a 
territory  which  the  Mexicans  claimed  as  their  own.  The 
President  says  "  It  is  ours,"  but  the  Mexicans  also  claimed 
it,  and  were  in  possession  thereof  until  forcibly  expelled. 


92  SERMON    OF 

This  is  a  plain  case,  and  as  I  have  elsewhere  treated  at 
length  of  this  matter,*  I  will  not  dwell  upon  it  again,  except 
to  mention  a  single  fact  but  recently  divulged.  It  is  well 
known  that  Mr.  Polk  claimed  the  territory  west  of  the 
Nueces  and  east  of  the  Rio  Grande,  as  forming  a  part  of 
Texas,  and  therefore  as  forming  part  of  the  United  States 
after  the  annexation  of  Texas.  He  contends  that  Mexico 
began  the  war  by  attacking  the  American  army  while  in 
that  territory  and  near  the  Rio  Grande.  But,  from  the 
correspondence  laid  before  the  American  Senate,  in  its 
secret  session  for  considering  the  treaty,  it  now  appears 
that  on  the  10th  of  November,  1845,  Mr.  Polk  instructed 
Mr.  Slidell  to  offer  a  relinquishment  of  American  claims 
against  Mexico,  amounting  to  $5,000,000  or  $6,000,000, 
for  the  sake  of  having  the  Rio  Grande  as  the  western 
boundary  of  Texas ;  yes,  for  that  very  territory  which  he 
says  was  ours  without  paying  a  cent.  When  it  was  con- 
quered, a  military  government  was  established  there,  as  in 
other  places  in  Mexico. 

The  other  remarkable  thing  about  the  war  is,  the  manner 
of  its  conclusion.  The  treaty  of  peace  which  has  just  been 
ratified  by  the  Mexican  authorities,  and  which  puts  an  end 
to  the  war,  was  negotiated  by  a  man  who  had  no  more 
legal  authority  than  any  one  of  us  has  to  do  it.  Mr.  Polk 
made  the  war,  without  consulting  Congress,  and  that  body 
adopted  the  war  by  a  vote  almost  unanimous.  Mr.  Nicholas 
P.  Trist  made  the  treaty,  without  consulting  the  President ; 
yes,  even  after  the  President  had  ordered  him  to  return 
home.  As  the  Congress  adopted  Mr.  Folk's  war,  so  Mr. 
Polk  adopted  Mr.  Trist's  treaty,  and  the  war  illegally  begun 
is  brought  informally  to  a  close.  Mr.  Polk  is  now  in  the 
President's  chair,  seated  on  the  throne  of  the  Union, 

*  In  the  Massachusetts  Quarterly  Review,  Vol.  I.  Article  I.  See 
also  the  paper  on  the  administration  of  Mr.  Polk,  in  Vol.  III.  Art. 
VIII. 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  93 

although  he  made  the  war ;  and  Mr.  Triet,  it  is  said,  is 
under  arrest  for  making  the  treaty,  meddling  with  what 
was  none  of  his  business. 

When  the  war  began,  there  was  a  good  deal  of  talk  about 
it  here ;  talk  against  it.  But,  as  things  often  go  in  Boston, 
it  ended  in  talk.  The  news-boys  made  money  out  of  the 
war.  Political  parties  were  true  to  their  wonted  principles, 
or  their  wonted  prejudices.  The  friends  of  the  party  in 
power  could  see  no  informality  in  the  beginning  of  hostili- 
ties ;  no  injustice  in  the  war  itself;  not  even  an  impolicy. 
They  were  offended  if  an  obscure  man  preached  against  it 
of  a  Sunday.  The  political  opponents  of  the  party  in 
power  talked  against  the  war,  as  a  matter  of  course ;  but, 
when  the  elections  came,  supported  the  men  that  made  it 
with  unusual  alacrity  —  their  deeds  serving  as  commentary 
upon  their  words,  and  making  further  remark  thereon,  in 
this  place,  quite  superfluous.  Many  men,  —  who,  what- 
ever other  parts  of  Scripture  they  may  forget,  never  cease 
to  remember  that  "Money  answereth  all  things,"  —  dili- 
gently set  themselves  to  make,  money  out  of  the  war  and 
the  new  turn  it  gave  to  national  affairs.  Others  thought 
that  "  glory "  was  a  good  thing,  and  so  engaged  in  the 
war  itself,  hoping  to  return,  in  due  time,  all  glittering  with 
its  honors. 

So  what  with  the  one  political  party  that  really  praised 
the  war,  and  the  other  who  affected  to  oppose  it,  and  with 
the  commercial  party,  who  looked  only  for  a  market  — 
this  for  merchandise  and  that  for  "  patriotism  "  —  the  friends 
of  peace,  who  seriously  and  heartily  opposed  the  war,  were 
very  few  in  number.  True,  the  "  sober  second  thought "  of 
the  people  has  somewhat  increased  their  number ;  but  they 
are  still  few,  mostly  obscure  men. 

Now  peace  has  come,  nobody  talks  much  about  it ;  the 
news-boys  have  scarce  made  a  cent  by  the  news.  They 
fired  cannons,  a  hundred  guns  on  the  Common,  for  joy 


94  SERMON    OF 

at  the  victory  of  Monterey  ;  at  Philadelphia,  Baltimore, 
Washington,  New  York,  men  illuminated  their  houses  in 
honor  of  the  battle  of  Buena  Vista,  I  think  it  was ;  the 
custom-house  was  officially  illuminated  at  Boston  for  that 
occasion.  But  we  hear  of  no  cannons  to  welcome  the 
peace.  Thus  far,  it  does  not  seem  that  a  single  candle  has 
been  burnt  in  rejoicing  for  that.  The  newspapers  are  full 
of  talk,  as  usual ;  flags  are  flying  in  the  streets  ;  the  air  is  a 
little  noisy  with  hurrahs,  but  it  is  all  talk  about  the  con- 
ventions at  Baltimore  and  Philadelphia  ;  hurrahs  for  Taylor 
and  Cass.  Nobody  talks  of  the  peace.  Flags  enough  flap 
in  the  wind,  with  the  names  of  rival  candidates ;  but 
nowhere  do  the  stripes  and  stars  bear  Peace  as  their  motto. 
The  peace  now  secured  is  purchased  with  such  conditions 
imposed  on  Mexico,  that  while  every  one  will  be  glad  of  it, 
no  man,  that  loves  justice,  can  be  proud  of  it.  Very  little 
is  said  about  the  treaty.  The  distinguished  senator  from 
Massachusetts  did  himself  honor,  it  seems  to  me,  in  voting 
against  it  on  the  ground  that  it  enabled  us  to  plunder  Mexico 
of  her  land.  But  the  treaty  contains  some  things  highly 
honorable  to  the  character  of  the  nation,  of  which  we  may 
well  enough  be  proud,  if  ever  of  any  thing.  I  refer  to  the 
twenty-second  and  twenty-third  articles,  which  provide  for 
arbitration  between  the  nations,  if  future  difficulties  should 
occur  ;  and  to  the  pains  taken,  in  case  of  actual  hostilities, 
for  the  security  of  all  unarmed  persons,  for  the  protection 
of  private  property,  and  for  the  humane  treatment  of  all 
prisoners  taken  in  war.  These  ideas,  and  the  language  of 
these  articles,  are  copied  from  the  celebrated  treaty  between 
the  United  States  and  Prussia,  the  treaty  of  1785.  It  is 
scarcely  needful  to  add,  that  they  were  then  introduced  by 
that  great  and  good  man,  Benjamin  Franklin,  one  of  the 
negotiators  of  the  treaty.  They  made  a  new  epoch  in 
diplomacy,  and  introduced  a  principle  previously  unknown 
in  the  law  of  nations.  The  insertion  of  these  articles  in 
the  new  treaty  is,  perhaps,  the  only  thing  connected  with 


THE    MEXICAN    WAH.  95 

the  war  which  an  American  can  look  upon  with  satisfaction. 
Yet  this  fact  excites  no  attention.* 

Still,  while  so  little  notice  is  taken  of  this  matter,  in  public 
and  private,  it  may  be  worth  while  for  a  minister,  on  Sun- 
day, to  say  a  word  about  the  peace  ;  and,  now  the  war  is 
over,  to  look  back  upon  it,  to  see  what  it  has  cost,  in  money 
and  in  men,  and  what  we  have  got  by  it ;  what  its  conse- 
quences have  been,  thus  far,  and  are  likely  to  be  for  the 
future  ;  what  new  dangers  and  duties  come  from  this  cause 
interpolated  into  our  nation.  We  have  been  long  promised 
"  indemnity  for  the  past,  and  security  for  the  future:"  let 
us  see  what  we  are  to  be  indemnified  for,  and  what  secured 
against.  The  natural  justice  of  the  war  I  will  not  look  at 
now. 

First,  then,  of  the  cost  of  the  war.  Money  is  the  first 
thing  with  a  good  many  men  ;  the  only  thing  with  some  ; 
and  an  important  thing  with  all.  So,  first  of  all,  let  me 
speak  of  the  cost  of  the  war  in  dollars.  It  is  a  little 
difficult  to  determine  the  actual  cost  of  the  war,  thus  far  — 
even  its  direct  cost ;  for  the  bills  are  not  all  in  the  hands  of 
Government ;  and  then,  as  a  matter  of  political  party -craft, 
the  Government,  of  course,  is  unwilling  to  let  the  full  cost 
become  known  before  the  next  election  is  over.  So  it  is  to 
be  expected  that  the  Government  will  keep  the  facts  from  the 
people  as  long  as  possible.  Most  Governments  would  do  the 
same.  But  Truth  has  a  right  of  way  everywhere,  and  will 
recover  it  at  last,  spite  of  the  adverse  possession  of  a 
political  party.  The  indirect  cost  of  the  war  must  be  still 
more  difficult  to  come  at,  and  will  long  remain  a  matter  of 
calculation,  in  which  it  is  impossible  to  reach  certainty.  We 
do  not  know  yet  the  entire  cost  of  the  Florida  war,  or  the 

*  Mr.  Trist  introduced  these  articles  into  the  treaty,  without  having 
instructions  from  the  American  Government  to  do  so ;  the  honor 
therefore,  is  wholly  due  to  him.  There  were  some  in  the  Senate  who 
opposed  these  articles. 


96  SERMON    OF 

late  war  with  England  ;    the  complete  cost  of  the  Revo- 
lutionary war  must  for  ever  be  unknown. 

It  is  natural  for  most  men  to  exaggerate  what  favors  their 
argument ;  but  when  I  cannot  obtain  the  exact  figures,  I 
will  come  a  good  deal  within  the  probable  amount.  The 
military  and  naval  appropriations  for  the  year  ending  in 
June,  1847,  were  $40,865,155.96 ;  for  the  next  year, 
$31,377,679.92 ;  the  sum  asked  for  the  present  year,  till  next 
June,  $42,224,000;  making  a  whole  of  $114,466,835.88. 
It  is  true  that  all  this  appropriation  is  not  for  the  Mexican 
war,  but  it  is  also  true  that  this  sum  does  not  include  all  the 
appropriations  for  the  war.  Estimating  the  sums  already 
paid  by  the  Government,  the  private  claims  presented  and  to 
be  presented,  the  $15,000,000  to  be  paid  Mexico  as  purchase 
money  for  the  territory  we  take  from  her,  the  $5,000,000  or 
$6,000,000  to  be  paid  our  own  citizens  for  their  claims 
against  her,  —  I  think  I  am  a  good  deal  within  the  mark 
when  I  say  the  war  will  have  cost  $150,000,000  before  the 
soldiers  are  at  home,  discharged,  and  out  of  the  pay  of  the 
state.  In  this  sum  I  do  not  include  the  bounty-lands  to  be 
given  to  the  soldiers  and  officers,  nor  the  pensions  to  be 
paid  them,  their  widows  and  orphans,  for  years  to  come.  I 
will  estimate  that  at  $50,000,000  more,  making  a  whole  of 
$200,000,000  which  has  been  paid  or  must  be.  This  is  the 
direct  cost  to  the  Federal  Government,  and  of  course  does 
not  include  the  sums  paid  by  individual  States,  or  bestowed 
by  private  generosity,  to  feed  and  clothe  the  volunteers 
before  they  were  mustered  into  service.  This  may  seem 
extravagant ;  but,  fifty  years  hence,  when  party  spirit  no 
longer  blinds  men's  eyes,  and  when  the  whole  is  a  matter  of 
history,  I  think  it  will  be  thought  moderate,  and  be  found  a 
good  deal  within  the  actual  and  direct  cost.  Some  of  this 
cost*  will  appear  as  a  public  debt.  Statements  recently 
made  respecting  it  can  hardly  be  trusted,  notwithstanding 
the  authority  on  which  they  rest.  Part  of  this  war  debt  is 
funded  already,  part  not  yet  funded.  When  the  outstanding 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  97 

demands  are  all  settled,  and  the  treasury  notes  redeem- 
ed, there  will  probably  be  a  war  debt  of  not  less  than 
$125,000,000.  At  least,  such  is  the  estimate  of  an  im- 
partial and  thoroughly  competent  judge.  But,  not  to  ex- 
aggerate, let  us  call  it  only  $100,000,000. 

It  will,  perhaps,  be  said  :  Part  of  this  money,  all  that  is 
paid  in  pensions,  is  a  charity,  and  therefore  no  loss.  But  it 
is  a  charity  paid  to  men  who,  except  for  the  war,  would 
have  needed  no  such  aid  ;  and,  therefore,  a  waste.  Of  the 
actual  cost  of  the  war,  some  three  or  four  millions  have 
been  spent  in  extravagant  prices  for  hiring  or  purchasing 
ships,  in  buying  provisions  and  various  things  needed  by  the 
army,  and  supplied  by  political  favorites  at  exorbitant  rates. 
This  is  the. only  portion  of  the  cost  which  is  not  a  sheer 
waste ;  here  the  money  has  only  changed  hands  ;  nothing 
has  been  destroyed,  except  the  honesty  of  the  parties  con- 
cerned in  such  transactions.  If  a  farmer  hires  men  to  help 
him  till  the  soil,  the  men  earn  thejr  subsistence  and  their 
wages,  and  leave,  besides,  a  profit  to  their  employer ;  when 
the  season  is  over,  he  has  his  crops  and  his  improvements  as 
the  return  for  their  pay  and  subsistence.  But  for  all  that 
the  soldier  has  consumed,  for  his  wages,  his  clothes,  his 
food  and  drink,  the  fighting  tools  he  has  worn  out,  and  the 
ammunition  he  has  expended,  there  is  no  available  return  to 
show ;  all  that  is  a  clear  waste,.  The  beef  is  eaten  up,  the 
cloth  worn  away,  the  powder  is  burnt,  and  what  is  there  to 
show  for  it  all  ?  Nothing  but  the  "  glory."  You  sent  out 
sound  men,  and  they  come  back,  many  of  them,  sick  and 
maimed  ;  some  of  them  are  slain. 

The  indirect  pecuniary  cost  of  the  war  is  caused,  first,  by 
diverting  some  150,000  men,  engaged  in  the  war  directly  or 
remotely,  from  the  works  of  productive  industry,  to  the 
labors  of  war,  which  produce  nothing  ;  and,  secondly,  by 
disturbing  the  regular  business  of  the  country,  first  by  the 
withdrawal  of  men  from  their  natural  work  ;  then,  by  with- 
drawing large  quantities  of  money  from  the  active  capital  of 
9 


98  SERMON    OF 

the  nation  ;  and,  finally,  by  the  general  uncertainty  which  it 
causes  all  over  the  land,  thus  hindering  men  from  under- 
taking or  prosecuting  successfully  their  various  productive 
enterprises.  If  150,000  men  earn  on  the  average  but  $200 
a-piece,  that  alone  amounts  to  $30,000,000.  The  with- 
drawal of  such  an  amount  of  labor  from  the  common 
industry  of  the  country  must  be  seriously  felt.  At  any  rate, 
the  nation  has  earned  $30,000,000  less  than  it  would  have 
done,  if  these  men  had  kept  about  their  common  work. 

But  the  diversion  of  capital  from  its  natural  and  pacific 
direction  is  a  greater  evil  in  this  case.  America  is  rich,  but 
her  wealth  consists  mainly  in  land,  in  houses,  cattle,  ships, 
and  various  things  needed  for  human  comfort  and  industry. 
In  money,  we  are  poor.  The  amount  of  money  is  small  in 
proportion  to  the  actual  wealth  of  the  nation,  and  also  in 
proportion  to  its  activity  which  is  indicated  by  the  business 
of  the  nation.  In  actual  wealth,  the  free  States  of  America 
are  probably  the  richest  people  in  the  world  ;  but  in  money 
we  are  poorer  than  many  other  nations.  This  is  plain 
enough,  though  perhaps  not  very  well  known,  and  is  shown 
by  the  fact  that  interest,  in  European  States,  is  from  two  to 
four  per  cent,  a  year,  and  in  America  from  six  to  nine.  The 
active  capital  of  America  is  small.  Now  in  this  war,  a 
national  debt  has  accumulated,  which  probably  is  or  will 
soon  be  §100,000,000,  or  $125,000,000.  All  this  great 
sum  of  money  has,  of  course,  been  taken  from  the  active 
capital  of  the  country,  and  there  has  been  so  much  less  for 
the  use  of  the  farmer,  the  manufacturer,  and  the  merchant. 
But  for  this  war,  these  150,000  men  and  these  §100,000,000 
would  have  been  devoted  to  productive  industry  ;  and  the 
result  would  have  been  shown  by  the  increase  of  our  annual 
earnings,  in  increased  wealth  and  comfort. 

Then  war  produced  uncertainty,  and  that  distrust  amongst 
men.  Therefore  many  were  hindered  from  undertaking 
ne<v  works,  and  others  found  their  old  enterprises  ruined  at 
once.  In  this  way  there  has  been  a  great  loss,  which  cannot 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  99 

be  accurately  estimated.  I  think  no  man,  familiar  with 
American  industry,  would  rate  this  indirect  loss  lower  than 
$100,000,000;  some,  perhaps,  at  twice  as  much;  but  to 
avoid  all  possibility  of  exaggeration,  let  us  call  it  half  the 
smallest  of  these  sums  or  §50,000,000  as  the  complete 
pecuniary  cost  of  the  Mexican  war,  direct  and  indirect. 

What  have  we  got  to  show  for  all  this  money  ?  We  have 
a  large  tract  of  territory,  containing,  in  all,  both  east  and 
west  of  the  Rio  Grande,  I  am  told,  between  700,000  and 
800,000  square  miles.  Accounts  differ  as  to  its  value.  But 
it  appears,  from  the  recent  correspondence  of  Mr.  Slidell, 
that  in  1845  the  President  offered  Mexico,  in  money, 
$25,000,000  for  that  territory  which  we  now  acquire  under 
this  new  treaty.  Suppose  it  is  worth  more,  suppose  it  is 
worth  twice  as  much,  or  all  the  indirect  cost  of  the  war 
($50,000,000),  then  the  $200,000,000  are  thrown  away. 

Now,  for  this  last  sum,  we  could  have  built  a  sufficient 
railroad  across  the  Isthmus  of  Panama,  and  another  across 
the  continent,  from  the  Mississippi  to  the  Pacific.  If  such 
'a  road,  with  its  suitable  equipment,  cost  $100,000  a  mile, 
and  the  distance  should  amount  to  2000  miles,  then  the 
$200,000,000  would  just  pay  the  bills.  That  would  have 
been  the  greatest  national  work  of  productive  industry  in 
the  world.  In  comparison  with  it,  the  Lake  Mceris  and  the 
Pyramids  of  Egypt  and  the  Wall  of  China  seem  but  the 
works  of  a  child.  It  might  be  a  work  to  be  proud  of  till 
the  world  ends ;  one,  too,  which  would  advance  the  indus- 
try, the  welfare,  and  general  civilization  of  mankind  to  a 
great  degree,  diminishing,  by  half,  the  distance  round  the 
globe  ;  saving  millions  of  property  and  many  lives  each 
year ;  besides  furnishing,  it  is  thought,  a  handsome  income 
from  the  original  outlay.  But,  perhaps,  that  would  not  be 
the  best  use  which  might  be  made  of  the  money  ;  perhaps 
it  would  not  have  been  wise  to  undertake  that  work.  I  do 
not  pretend  to  judge  of  such  matters,  only  to  show  what 
might  be  done  with  that  sum  of  money,  if  we  were  disposed 


100  SERMON    OF 

to  construct  works  of  such  a  character.  At  any  rate,  t\vn 
Pacific  railroads  would  be  better  than  one  Mexican  war. 
We  are  seldom  aware  of  the  cost  of  war.  If  a  single 
regiment  of  dragoons  costs  only  $700,000  a  year,  which  is 
a  good  deal  less  than  the  actual  cost,  that  is  considerably 
more  than  the  cost  of  twelve  colleges  like  Harvard  University, 
with  its  schools  for  theology,  law,  and  medicine  ;  its  scientific 
school,  observatory  and  all.  We  are,  taken  as  a  whole,  a 
very  ignorant  people  ;  and  while  we  waste  our  school- 
money  and  school-time,  must  continue  so. 

A  great  man,  who  towers  far  above  the  common  heads, 
full  of  creative  thought,  of  the  ideas  which  move  the  world, 
able  to  organize  that  thought  into  institutions,  laws,  prac- 
tical works;  a  man  of  a  million,  a  million-minded  man,  at 
the  head  of  a  nation,  putting  his  thought  into  them  ;  ruling 
not  barely  by  virtue  of  his  position,  but  by  the  intellectual 
and  moral  power  to  fill  it ;  ruling  not  over  men's  heads, 
but  in  their  minds  and  hearts,  and  leading  them  to  new 
fields  of  toil,  increasing  their  numbers,  wealth,  intelligence, 
comfort,  morals,  piety  —  such  a  man  is  a  noble  sight;  a 
Charlemagne,  or  a  Genghis  Khan,  a  Moses  leading  his 
nation  up  from  Egyptian  bondage  to  freedom  and  the 
promised  land.  How  have  the  eyes  of  the  world  been  fixed 
on  Washington !  In  darker  days  than  ours,  when  all  was 
violence,  it  is  easy  to  excuse  such  men  if  they  were  war- 
riors also,  and  made,  for  the  time,  their  nation  but  a  camp. 
There  have  been  ages  when  the  most  lasting  ink  was  human 
blood.  In  our  day,  when  war  is  the  exception,  and  that 
commonly  needless,  such  a  man,  so  getting  the  start  of  the 
majestic  world,  were  a  far  grander  sight.  And  with  such  a 
man  at  the  head  of  this  nation,  a  great  man  at  the  head  of 
a  free  nation,  able  and  energetic  and  enterprising  as  we  are, 
what  were  too  much  to  hope  ?  As  it  is,  we  have  wasted 
our  money,  and  got,  the  honor  of  fighting  such  a  war. 

Let  me  next  speak  of  the  direct  cost  of  the  war  in  men. 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  101 

In  April,  1846,  the  entire  army  of  the  United  States  con- 
sisted of  7244  men ;  the  naval  force  of  about  7500.  We 
presented  the  gratifying  spectacle  of  a  nation  20,000,000 
strong,  with  a  sea-coast  of  3000  or  4000  miles,  and  only 
7000  or  8000  soldiers,  and  as  many  armed  men  on  the  sea, 
or  less  than  15,000  in  all !  Few  things  were  more  grateful 
to  an  American  than  this  thought,  that  his  country  was  so 
nearly  free  from  the  terrible  curse  of  a  standing  army. 
At  that  time,  the  standing  army  of  France  was  about 
480,000  men  ;  that  of  Russia  nearly  800,000,  it  is  said. 
Most  of  the  officers  in  the  American  army  and  navy,  and 
most  of  the  rank  and  file,  had  probably  entered  the  service 
with  no  expectation  of  ever  shedding  the  blood  of  men. 
The  navy  and  army  were  looked  on  as  instruments  of 
peace  ;  as  much  so  as  the  police  of  a  city. 

The  first  of  last  January,  there  was,  in  Mexico,  an  Amer- 
ican army  of  23,695  regular  soldiers,  and  a  little  more  than 
50,000  volunteers,  the  number  cannot  now  be  exactly  deter- 
mined, making  an  army  of  invasion  of  about  75,000  men. 
The  naval  forces,  also,  had  been  increased  to  10,000.  Esti- 
mating all  the  men  engaged  in  the  service  of  the  army  and 
navy  ;  in  making  weapons  of  war  and  ammunition  ;  in  pre- 
paring food  and  clothing ;  in  transporting  those  things  and 
the  soldiers  from  place  to  plape,  by  land  or  sea,  and  in 
performing  the  various  other  works  incident  to  military 
operations,  it  is  within  bounds  to  say  that  there  were  80,000 
or  90,000  men  engaged  indirectly  in  the  works  of  war. 
But  not  to  exaggerate,  it  is  safe  to  say  that  150,000  men 
were  directly  or  indirectly  engaged  in  the  Mexican  war. 
This  estimate  will  seem  moderate,  when  you  remember  that 
there  were  about  5000  teamsters  connected  with  the  army  in 
Mexico. 

Here,  then,  were  150,000  men,  whose  attention  and  toil 
were  diverted  from  the  great  business  of  productive  indus- 
try to  merely  military  operations,  or  preparations  for  them. 
Of  course,  all  the  labor  of  these  men  was  of  no  direct 
9* 


102  SERMON    OF 

value  to  the  human  race.  The  food  and  clothing  and  labor 
of  a  man  who  earns  nothing  by  productive  work  of  hand  or 
head,  is  food,  clothing,  and  labor  thrown  away ;  labor  in 
vain.  There  is  nothing  to  show  for  the  things  he  has  con- 
sumed. So  all  the  work  spent  in  preparing  ammunition 
and  weapons  of  war  is  labor  thrown  away,  an  absolute  loss, 
as  much  as  if  it  been  spent  in  making  earthen  pitchers  and 
then  in  dashing  them  to  pieces.  A  country  is  the  richer 
for  every  serviceable  plough  and  spade  made  in  it,  and  the 
world  the  richer ;  they  are  to  be  used  in  productive  work, 
and  when  worn  out,  there  is  the  improved  soil  and  the  crops 
that  have  been  gathered,  to  show  for  the  wear  and  tear  of 
the  tools.  So  a  country  is  the  richer  for  every  industrious 
shoemaker  and  blacksmith  it  contains  ;  for  his  time  and  toil 
go  to  increase  the  sum  of  human  comfort,  creating  actual 
wealth.  The  world  also  is  better  off,  and  becomes  better 
through  their  influence.  But  a  country  is  the  poorer  for 
every  soldier  it  maintainst  and  the  world  poorer,  as  he  adds 
nothing  to  the  actual  wealth  of  mankind  ;  so  is  it  the  poorer 
for  each  sword  and  cannon  made  within  its  borders,  and  the 
world  poorer,  for  these  instruments  cannot  be  used  in  any 
productive  work,  only  for  works  of  destruction. 

So  much  for  the  labor  of  these  150,000  men ;  labor 
wasted  in  vain.  Let  us  no\%  look  at  the  cost  of  life.  It  is 
not  possible  to  ascertain  the  exact  loss  suffered  up  to  this 
time,  in  killed,  deceased  by  ordinary  diseases,  and  in 
wounded  ;  for  some  die  before  they  are  mustered  into  the 
service  of  the  United  States,  and  parts  of  the  army  are  so 
far  distant  from  the  seat  of  Government  that  their  recent 
losses  are  still  unknown.  I  rely  for  information  on  the  last 
report  of  the  Secretary  of  War,  read  before  the  Senate  April 
10th,  1848,  and  recently  printed.  That  gives  the  losses  of 
parts  of  the  army  up  to  December  last ;  other  accounts  are 
made  up  only  till  October,  or  till  August.  Recent  losses 
will  of  course  swell  the  amount  of  destruction.  According 
to  that  report,  on  the  American  side  there  has  been  killed  in 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  103 

battle,  or  died  of  wounds  received  therein,  1,689  persons; 
there  had  died  of  diseases  and  accidents,  6,173  ;  3,743  have 
been  wounded  in  battle  who  were  not  known  to  be  dead  at 
the  date  of  the  report. 

This  does  not  include  the  deaths  in  the  navy,  nor  the 
destruction  of  men  connected  with  the  army  in  various  ways, 
as  furnishing  supplies  and  the  like.  Considering  the  sick- 
ness and  accidents  that  have  happened  in  the  present  year, 
and  others  which  may  be  expected  before  the  troops  reach 
home,  I  may  set  down  the  total  number  of  deaths  on  the 
American  side,  caused  by  the  war,  at  15,000,  and  the 
number  of  wounded  men  at  4,000.  Suppose  the  army  on 
the  average  to  have  consisted  of  50,000  men  for  two  years, 
this  gives  a  mortality  of  15  per  cent,  each  year,  which  is  an 
enormous  loss  even  for  times  of  war,  and  one  seldom 
equalled  in  modern  warfare. 

Now,  most  of  the  men  who  have  thus  died  or  been 
maimed  were  in  the  prime  of  life,  able-bodied  and  hearty 
men.  Had  they  remained  at  home  in  the  works  of  peace, 
it  is  not  likely  that  more  than  500  of  the  number  would  have 
died.  So  then  14,500  lives  may  be  set  down  at  once  to  the 
account  of  the  war.  The  wounded  men  are  of  course  to 
thank  the  war,  and  that  alone,  for  their  smart  and  the  life- 
long agony  which  they  are  called  on  to  endure. 

Such  is  the  American  loss.  The  loss  of  the  Mexicans  we 
cannot  now  determine.  But  they  have  been  many  times 
more  numerous  than  the  Americans ;  have  been  badly 
armed,  badly  commanded,  badly  trained,  and  besides  have 
been  beaten  in  every  battle  ;  their  number  seemed  often  the 
cause  of  their  ruin,  making  them  confident  before  battle  and 
hindering  their  retreat  after  they  were  beaten.  Still  more, 
they  have  been  ill  provided  with  surgeons  and  nurses  to  care 
for  the  wounded,  and  were  destitute  of  medicines.  They 
must  have  lost  in  battle  five  or  six  times  more  than  we  have 
done,  and  have  had  a  proportionate  number  of  wounded. 
To  "  lie  like  a  military  bulletin  "  is  a  European  proverb ; 


104  SERMON    OF 

and  it  is  not  necessary  to  trust  reports  which  tell  of  600  or 
900  Mexicans  left  dead  on  the  ground,  while  the  Americans 
lost  but  five  or  six.  But  when  we  remember  that  only  12 
Americans  were  killed  during  the  bombardment  of  Vera 
Cruz,  which  lasted  five  days ;  that  the  citadel  contained 
more  than  5,000  soldiers  and  over  400  pieces  of  cannon, 
we  may  easily  believe  the  Mexican  losses  on  the  whole  have 
been  10,000  men  killed  and  perished  of  their  wounds. 
Their  loss  by  sickness  would  probably  be  smaller  than  our 
own,  for  the  Mexicans  were  in  their  native  climate,  though 
often  ill  furnished  with  clothes,  with  shelter  and  provisions  : 
so  I  will  put  down  their'  loss  by  ordinary  diseases  at  only 
5,000,  making  a  total  of  15,000  deaths.  Suppose  their 
number  of  wounded  was  four  times  as  great  as  our  own,  or 
20,000.  I  should  not  be  surprised  if  this  were  only  half  the 
number. 

Put  all  together  and  we  have  in  total,  Americans  and 
Mexicans,  24,000  men  wounded,  more  or  less,  and  the 
greater  part  maimed  for  life ;  and  we  have  30,000  men 
killed  on  the  field  of  battle,  or  perished  by  the  slow  torture 
of  their  wounds,  or  deceased  of  diseases  caused  by  extra- 
ordinary exposures ;  24,000  men  maimed  ;  30,000  dead ! 

You  all  remember  the  bill  which  so  hastily  passed  Con- 
gress in  May,  1846,  and  authorized  the  war  previously 
begun.  You  perhaps  have  not  forgot  the  preamble,  "  Where- 
as war  exists  by  the  act  of  Mexico."  Well,  that  bill 
authorized  the  waste  of  $200,000,000  of  American  treasure, 
money  enough  to  have  built  a  railroad  across  the  Isthmus  of 
Panama,  and  another  to  connect  the  Mississippi  and  the 
Pacific  ocean ;  it  demanded  the  disturbance  of  industry  and 
commerce  all  over  the  land,  caused  by  withdrawing  $100, 
000,000  from  peaceful  investments,  and  diverting  150,000 
Americans  from  their  productive  and  peaceful  works ;  it 
demanded  a  loss  yet  greater  of  the  treasure  of  Mexicans  ;  it 
commanded  the  maiming  of  24,000  men  for  life,  and  the 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  105 

death  of  30,000  men  in  the  prime  and  vigor  of  manhood. 
Yet  such  was  the  state  of  feeling,  I  will  not  say  of  thought, 
in  the  Congress,  that  out  of  both  houses  only  16  men  voted 
against  it.  If  a  prophet  had  stood  there  he  mi|ht  have  said 
to  the  representative  of  Boston,  "  You  have  just  voted  for 
the  wasting  of  200,000,000  of  the  very  dollars  you  were 
sent  there  to  represent ;  for  the  maiming  of  24,000  men  and 
the  killing  of  30,000  more  —  part  by  disease,  part  by  the 
sword,  part  by  the  slow  and  awful  lingerings  of  a  wounded 
frame !  Sir,  that  is  the  English  of  your  vote."  Suppose 
the  prophet,  before  the  vote  was  taken,  could  have  gone 
round  and  told  each  member  of  Congress,  "  If  there  comes 
a  war,  you  will  perish  in  it ; "  perhaps  the  vote  would  have 
been  a  little  different.  It  is  easy  to  vote  away  blood,  if  it  is 
not  your  own  ! 

Such  is  the  cost  of  the  war  in  money  and  in  men.  Yet 
it  has  not  been  a  very  cruel  war.  It  has  been  conducted 
with  as  much  gentleness  as  a  war  of  invasion  can  be. 
There  is  no  agreeable  way  of  butchering  men.  You  cannot 
make  it  a  pastime.  The  Americans  have  always  been  a 
brave  people  ;  they  were  never  cruel.  They  always  treated 
their  prisoners  kindly  —  in  the  Revolutionary  war,  in  the 
late  war  with  England.  True,  they  have  seized  the  Mexi- 
can ports,  taken  military  possession  of  the  custom-houses, 
and  collected  such  duties  as  they  saw  fit ;  true,  they  some- 
times made  the  army  of  invasion  self-subsisting,  and  to  that 
end  have  levied  contributions  on  the  towns  they  have  taken  ; 
true,  they  have  seized  provisions  which  were  private  prop- 
erty, snatching  them  out  of  the  hands  of  men  who  needed 
them  ;  true,  they  have  robbed  the  rich  and  the  poor ;  true, 
they  have  burned  and  bombarded  towns,  have  murdered 
men  and  violated  women.  All  this  must  of  course  take 
place  in  any  war.  There  will  be  the  general  murder  and 
robbery  committed  on.  account  of  the  nation,  and  the  par- 
ticular murder  and  robbery  on  account  of  the  special  indi- 


106  SERMON    OF 

vidual.  This  also  is  to  be  expected.  You  cannot  set  a 
town  on  fire  and  burn  down  just  half  of  it,  making  the 
flames  stop  exactly  where  you  will.  You  cannot  take  the 
most  idle,  ignorant,  drunken,  and  vicious  men  out  of  the 
low  population  in  our  cities  and  large  towns,  get  them  drunk 
enough  or  foolish  enough  to  enlist,  train  them  to  violence, 
theft,  robbery,  murder,  and  then  stop  the  man  from  exer- 
cising his  rage  or  lust  on  his  own  private  account.  If  it  is 
hard  to  make  a  dog  understand  that  he  must  kill  a  hare  for 
his  master,  but  never  for  himself,  it  is  not  much  easier  to 
teach  a  volunteer  that  it  is  a  duty,  a  distinction,  and  a  glory 
to  rob  and  murder  the  Mexican  people  for  the  nation's  sake, 
but  a  wrong,  a  shame,  and  a  crime  to  rob  or  murder  a  single 
Mexican  for  his  own  sake.  There  have  been  instances  of 
wanton  cruelty,  occasioned  by  private  licentiousness  and 
individual  barbarity.  Of  these  I  shall  take  no  further  notice, 
but  come  to  such  as  have  been  commanded  by  the  Ameri- 
can authorities,  and  which  were  the  official  acts  of  the 
nation. 

One  was  the  capture  of  Tabasco.  Tabasco  is  a  small 
,  town  several  hundred  miles  from  the  theatre  of  war,  situated 
on  a  river  about  eighty  miles  from  the  sea,  in  the  midst  of 
a  fertile  province.  The  army  did  not  need  it,  nor  the  navy. 
It  did  not  lie  in  the  way  of  the  American  operations ;  its 
possession  would  be  wholly  useless.  But  one  Sunday  after- 
noon, while  the  streets  were  full  of  men,  women,  and  chil- 
dren, engaged  in  their  Sunday  business,  a  part  of  the  naval 
force  of  America  swept  by ;  the  streets  running  at  right 
angles  with  the  river,  were  enfiladed  by  the  hostile  cannon, 
and  men,  women,  and  children,  unarmed  and  unresisting, 
were  mowed  down  by  the  merciless  shot.  The  city  was 
taken,  but  soon  abandoned,  for  its  possession  was  of  no  use. 
The  killing  of  those  men,  women,  and  children  was  as 
much  a  piece  of  murder,  as  it  would  be  to  come  and  shoot 
us  to-day,  and  in  this  house.  No  valid  excuse  has  been 
given  for  this  cold-blooded  massacre ;  none  can  be  given. 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  107 

It  was  not  battle,  but  wanton  butchery.  None  but  a  Pequod. 
Indian  could  excuse  it.  The  theological  newspapers  in 
New  England  thought  it  a  wicked  thing  in  Dr.  Palfrey  to 
write  a. letter  on  Sunday,  though  he  hoped  thereby  to  help 
end  the  war.  How  many  of  them  had  any  fault  to  find 
with  this  national  butchery  on  the  Lord's  day  ?  Fighting  is 
bad  enough  any  day  ;  fighting  for  mere  pay,  or  glory,  or 
the  love  of  fighting,  is  a  wicked  thing ;  but  to  fight  on  that 
day  when  the  whole  Christian  world  kneels  to  pray  in  the 
name  of  the  Peacemaker  ;  to  butcher  men  and  women  and 
children,  when  they  are  coming  home  from  church,  with 
prayer-books  in  their  hands,  seems  an  aggravation  even  of 
murder ;  a  cowardly  murder,  which  a  Hessian  would  have 
been  ashamed  of.  u  But  'twas  a  famous  victory." 

One  other  instance,  of  at  least  apparent  wantonness,  took 
place  at  the  bombardment  of  Vera  Cruz.  After  the  siege 
had  gone  on  for  a  while,  the  foreign  consuls  in  the  town, 
"  moved,"  as  they  say,  "  by  the  feeling  of  humanity  ex- 
cited in  their  hearts  by  the  frightful  results  of  the  bombard- 
ment of  the  city,"  requested  that  the  women  and  children 
might  be  allowed  to  leave  the  city,  and  not  stay  to  be 
shot.  The  American  General  refused  ;  they  must  stay  and 
be  shot. 

Perhaps  you  have  not  an  adequate  conception  of  the 
effect  produced  by  bombarding  a  town.  Let  me  interest 
you  a  little  in  the  details  thereof.  Vera  Cruz  is  about  as 
large  as  Boston  in  1810 ;  it  contains  about  30,000  inhabi- 
tants. In  addition  it  is  protected  by  a  castle,  the  celebrated 
fortress  of  St.  Juan  d'  Ulloa,  furnished  with  more  than 
5000  soldiers  and  over  400  cannons.  Imagine  to  yourself 
Boston  as  it  was  forty  years  ago,  invested  with  a  fleet  on 
one  side,  and  an  army  of  15,000  men  on  the  land,  both 
raining  cannon-balls  and  bomb-shells  upon  your  houses  ; 
shattering  them  to  fragments,  exploding  in  your  streets, 
churches,  houses,  cellars,  mingling  men,  women,  and  chil- 
dren in  one  promiscuous  murder.  Suppose  this  to  continue 


108  SERMON    OF 

five  days  and  nights ;  imagine  the  condition  of  the  city  ; 
the  ruins,  the  flames;  the  dead,  the  wounded,  the  widows, 
orphans ;  think  of  the  fears  of  the  men  anticipating  the 
city  would  be  sacked  by  a  merciless  soldiery ;  think  of  the 
women !  Thus  you  will  have  a  faint  notion  of  the  picture 
of  Vera  Cruz  at  the  end  of  March,  1847.  Do  you  know 
the  meaning  of  the  name  of  the  city  ?  Vera  Cruz  is  the 
True  Cross.  "  See  how  these  Christians  love  one  another." 
The  Americans  are  followers  of  the  Prince  of  Peace  ;  they 
have  more  missionaries  amongst  the  "  heathen  "  than  any 
other  nation,  and  the  President,  in  his  last  message,  says, 
"  No  country  has  been  so  much  favored,  or  should  acknowl- 
edge with  deeper  reverence  the  manifestations  of  the  Divine 
protection."  The  Americans  were  fighting  Mexico  to  dis- 
member her  territory,  to  plunder  her  soil,  and  plant  thereon 
the  institution  of  slavery,  "  the  necessary  back-ground  of 
freedom." 

Few  of  us  have  ever  seen  a  battle,  and  without  that  none 
can  have  a  complete  notion  of  the  ferocious  passions  which 
it  excites.  Let  me  help  your  fancy  a  little  by  relating  an 
anecdote  which  seems  to  be  very  well  authenticated,  and 
requires  but  little  external  testimony  to  render  it  credible. 
At  any  rate,  it  was  abundantly  believed  a  year  ago  ;  but 
times  change,  and  what  was  then  believed  all  round  may 
now  be  "  the  most  improbable  thing  in  the  world."  At  the 
battle  of  Buena  Vista,  a  Kentucky  regiment  began  to  stagger 
under  the  heavy  charge  of  the  Mexicans.  The  American 
commander-in-chief  turned  to  one  who  stood  near  him,  and 
exclaimed,  "By  God,  this  will  not  do.  This  is  not  the  way 
for  Kentuckians  to  behave  when  called  on  to  make  good  a 
battle.  It  will  not  answer,  sir."  So  the  General  clenched 
his  fist,  knit  his  brows,  and  set  his  teeth  hard  together. 
However,  the  Kentuckians  presently  formed  in  good  order 
and  gave  a  deadly  fire;  which  altered  the  battle.  Then  the 
old  General  broke  out  with  a  loud  hurrah.  "  Hurrah  for 
old  Kentuck,"  he  exclaimed,  rising  in  his  stirrups;  "that's 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  109 

the  way  to  do  it.  Give  'em  hell,  damn  'em,"  and  tears  of 
exultation  rolled  down  his  cheeks  as  he  said  it.  You  find 
the  name  of  this  General  at  the  head  of  most  of  the  whig 
newspapers  in  the  United  States.  He  is  one  of  the  most 
popular  candidates  for  the  Presidency.  Cannons  were  fired 
for  him,  a  hundred  guns  on  Boston  Common,  not  long  ago, 
in  honor  of  his  nomination  for  the  highest  office  in  the  gift 
of  a  free  and  Christian  people.  Soon  we  shall  probably 
have  clerical  certificates,  setting  forth,  to  the  people  of  the 
North,  that  he  is  an  exemplary  Christian.  You  know  how 
Faneuil  Hall,  the  old  "  Cradle  of  Liberty,"  rang  with 
"  Hurrah  for  Taylor,"  but  a  few  days  ago.  The  seven 
wise  men  of  Greece  were  famous  in  their  day ;  but  now 
nothing  is  known  of  them  except  a  single  pungent  aphorism 
from  each,  "  Know  thyself,"  and  the  like.  The  time  may 
come  when  our  great  men  shall  have  suffered  this  same 
reduction  descending,  all  their  robes  of  glory  having  van- 
ished save  a  single  thread.  Then  shall  Franklin  be  known 
only  as  having  said,  "  Don't  give  too  much  for  the  Whistle"; 
Patrick  Henry  for  his  "  Give  me  Liberty  or  give  me  Death"; 
Washington  for  his  "  In  Peace  prepare  for  War " ;  Jeffer- 
son for  his  "  All  men  are  created  equal " ;  and  General 
Taylor  shall  be  known  only  by  his  attributes  rough  and 
ready,  and  for  his  aphorism,  "Give  'em  hell,  damn  'em." 
Yet  he  does  not  seem  to  be  a  ferocious  man,  but  generous 
and  kindly,  it  is  said,  and  strongly  opposed  to  this  particular 
war,  whose  "  natural  justice  "  it  seems  he  looked  at,  and 
which  he  thought  was  wicked  at  the  beginning,  though,  on 
that  account,  he  was  none  the  less  ready  to  fight  it. 

One  thing  more  I  must  mention  in  speaking  of  the  cost 
of  men.  According  to  the  Report  quoted  just  now,  4966 
American  soldiers  had  deserted  in  Mexico.  Some  of 
them  had  joined  the  Mexican  army.  When  the  American 
commissioners,  who  were  sent  to  secure  the  ratification 
of  the  treaty,  went  to  Queretaro,  they  found  there  a  body 
of  200  American  soldiers,  and  800  more  were  at  no 
10 


110  SERMON    OF 

great  distance,  mustered  into  the  Mexican  service.  These 
men,  it  seems,  had  served  out  their  time  in  the  American 
camp,  and  notwithstanding  they  had,  as  the  President  says 
in  his  message,  "  covered  themselves  with  imperishable 
honors,"  by  fighting  men  who  never  injured  them,  they 
were  willing  to  go  and  seek  a  yet  thicker  mantle  of  this 
imperishable  honor,  by  fighting  against  their  own  country ! 
Why  should  they  not?  If  it  were  right  to  kill  Mexicans 
for  a  few  dollars  a  month,  why  was  it  not  also  right  to  kill 
Americans,  especially  when  it  pays  the  most  ?  Perhaps  it 
is  not  an  American  habit  to  inquire  into  the  justice  of  a 
war,  only  into  the  profit  which  it  may  bring.  If  the  Mexi- 
cans pay  best,  in  money,  these  1000  soldiers  made  a  good 
speculation.  No  doubt  in  Mexico  military  glory  is  at  a 
premium,  though  it  could  hardly  command  a  greater  price 
just  now  than  in  America,  where,  however,  the  supply 
seems  equal  to  the  demand. 

The  numerous  desertions  and  the  readiness  with  which 
the  soldiers  joined  the  "  foe,"  show  plainly  the  moral  char- 
acter of  the  men,  and  the  degree  of  "  patriotism "  and 
"  humanity  "  which  animated  them  in  going  to  war.  You 
know  the  severity  of  military  discipline  ;  the  terrible  beat- 
ings men  are  subjected  to  before  they  can  become  perfect  in 
the  soldier's  art ;  the  horrible  and  revolting  punishments 
imposed  on  them  for  drunkenness,  though  little  pains  were 
taken  to  keep  the  temptation  from  their  eyes,  and  for  disobe- 
dience of  general  orders.  You  have  read  enough  of  this  in 
the  newspapers.  The  officers  of  the  volunteers,  I  am  told, 
have  generally  been  men  of  little  education,  men  of  strong 
passions  and  bad  habits ;  many  of  them  abandoned  men, 
who  belonged  to  the  refuse  of  society.  Such  men  run  into 
an  army  as  the  wash  of  the  street  runs  into  the  sewers. 
When  such  a  man  gets  clothed  with  a  little  authority,  in 
time  of  peace,  you  know  what  use  he  makes  of  it ;  but 
when  he  covers  himself  with  the  "  imperishable  honors " 
of  his  official  coat,  gets  an  epaulette  on  his  shoulder,  a 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  1  1  1 

sword  by  his  side,  a  commission  in  his  pocket,  and  visions 
of  "glory"  in  his  head,  you  may  easily  judge  how  he  will 
use  his  authority,  or  may  read  in  the  newspapers  how  he 
has  used  it.  When  there  are  brutal  soldiers,  commanded 
by  brutal  captains,  it  is  to  be  supposed  that  much  brutality 
is  to  be  suffered. 

Now  desertion  is  a  great  offence  in  a  soldier :  in  this 
army  it  is  one  of  the  most  common  ;  for  nearly  ten  per 
cent,  of  the  American  army  has  deserted  in  Mexico,  not  to 
mention  the  desertions  before  the  army  reached  that  country. 
It  is  related  that  forty-eight  men  were  hanged  at  once  for 
desertion  ;  not  hanged  as  you  judicially  murder  men  in 
time  of  peace,  privately,  as  if  ashamed  of  the  deed,  in  the 
corner  of  a  jail,  and  by  a  contrivance  which  shortens  the 
agony  and  makes  death  humane  as  possible.  These  forty- 
eight  men  were  hanged  slowly ;  put  to  death  with  painful 
procrastinations,  their  agony  wilfully  prolonged,  and  death 
embittered  by  needless  ferocity.  But  that  is  not  all :  it  is 
related,  that  these  men  were  doomed  to  be  thus  murdered 
on  the  day  when  the  battle  of  Churubusco  took  place. 
These  men,  awaiting  their  death,  were  told  they  should  not 
suffer  till  the  American  flag  should  wave  its  stripes  over  the 
hostile  walls.  So  they  were  kept  in  suspense  an  hour,  and 
then  slowly  hanged,  one  by  one.  You  know  the  name  of 
the  officer  on  whom  this  barbarity  rests :  it  was  Colonel 
Harney,  a  man  whose  reputation  was  black  enough  and 
base  enough  before.  His  previous  deeds,  however,  require 
no  mention  here.  But  this  man  is  now  a  General,  and  so 
on  the  high  road  to  the  Presidency,  whenever  it  shall  please 
our  Southern  masters  to  say  the  word.  Some  accounts  say 
there  were  more  than  forty-eight  who  thus  were  hanged. 
I  only  give  the  number  of  those  whose  names  lie  printed 
before  me  as  I  write.  Perhaps  the  number  was  less ;  it  is 
impossible  to  obtain  exact  information  in  respect  to  the 
matter,  for  the  Government  has  not  yet  published  an  account 
of  the  punishments  inflicted  in  this  war.  The  information 


112  SERMON    OF 

can  only  be  obtained  by  a  "  Resolution "  of  either  house 
of  Congress,  and  so  is  not  likely  to  be  had  before  the 
election.  But  at  the  same  time  with  the  execution,  other 
deserters  were  scourged  with  fifty  lashes  each,  branded 
with  a  letter  D,  a  perpetual  mark  of  infamy,  on  their  cheek, 
compelled  to  wear  an  iron  yoke,  weighing  eight  pounds, 
about  their  neck.  Six  men  were  made  to  dig  the  grave  of 
their  companions,  and  were  then  flogged  with  two  hundred 
lashes  each. 

I  wish  this  hanging  of  forty-eight  men  could  have  taken 
place  in  State  street,  and  the  respectable  citizens  of  Boston, 
who  like  this  war,  had  been  made  to  look  on  and  see  it  all ; 
that  they  had  seen  those  poor  culprits  bid  farewell  to 
father,  mother,  wife,  or  child,  looking  wistfully  for  the  hour 
which  was  to  end  their  torment,  and  then,  one  by  one,  have 
seen  them  slowly  hanged  to  death ;  that  your  representative, 
ye  men  of  Boston,  had  put  on  all  the  halters!  He  did  help 
put  them  on  ;  that  infamous  vote,  I  speak  not  of  the  motive, 
it  may  have  been  as  honorable  as  the  vote  itself  was  in- 
famous, doomed  these  eight  and  forty  men  to  be  thus 
murdered. 

Yes,  I  wish  all  this  killing  of  the  2000  Americans  on  the 
field  of  battle,  and  the  10,000  Mexicans ;  all  this  slashing  of 
the  bodies  of  24,000  wounded  men ;  all  the  agony  of  the 
other  18,000  that  have  died  of  disease,  could  have  taken 
place  in  some  spot  where  the  President  of  the  United  States 
and  his  Cabinet,  where  all  the  Congress  who  voted  for  the 
war,  with  the  Baltimore  conventions  of  '44  and  '48,  and  the 
Whig  convention  of  Philadelphia,  and  the  controlling  men 
of  both  political  parties,  who  care  nothing  for  this  bloodshed 
and  misery  they  have  idly  caused,  could  have  stood  and 
seen  it  all ;  and  then  that  the  voice  of  the  whole  nation  had 
come  up  to  them  and  said,  "  This  is  your  work,  not  ours. 
Certainly  we  will  not  shed  our  blood,  nor  our  brothers' 
blood,  to  get  never  so  much  slave  territory.  It  was  bad 
enough  to  fi^ht  in  the  cause  of  freedom.  In  the  cause  of 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  113 

slavery  —  God  forgive  us  for  that!     We  have  trusted  you 
thus  far,  but  please  God,  we  never  will  trust  you  again." 

Let  us  now  look  at  the  effect  of  this  war  on  the  morals  of 
the  nation.  The  Revolutionary  war  was  the  contest  for  a 
great  idea.  If  there  were  ever  a  just  war  it  was  that,  .1 
contest  for  national  existence.  Yet  it  brought  out  many  of 
the  worst  qualities  of  human  nature,  on  both  sides,  as  well 
as  some  of  the  best.  It  helped  make  a  Washington,  it  is 
true,  but  a  Benedict  Arnold  likewise.  A  war  with  a  powerful 
nation,  terrible  as  it  must  be,  yet  develops  the  energy  of  the 
people,  promotes  self-denial,  and  helps  the  growth  of  some 
qualities  of  a  high  order.  It  had  this  effect  in  England  from 
1798  to  1815.  True,  England  for  that  time  became  a 
despotism,  but  the  self-consciousness  of  the  nation,  its  self- 
denial  and  energy  were  amazingly  stimulated ;  the  moral 
effect  of  that  series  of  wars  was  doubtless  far  better  than  of 
the  infamous  contest  which  she  has  kept  up  against  Ireland 
for  many  years.  Let  us  give  even  war  its  due :  when  a 
great  boy  fights  with  an  equal,  it  may  develop  his  animal 
courage  and  strength  —  for  he  gets  as  bad  as  he  gives,  but 
when  he  only  beats  a  little  boy  that  cannot  pay  back  his 
blows,  it  is  cowardly  as  well  as  cruel,  and  doubly  debasing 
to  the  conqueror.  Mexico  was  no  match  for  America. 
We  all  knew  that  very  well  before  the  war  began.  When 
a  nation  numbering  8,000,000  or  9,000,000  of  people  can 
be  successfully  invaded  by  an  army  of  75,000  men,  two 
thirds  of  them  volunteers,  raw  and  undisciplined  ;  when  the 
invaders  with  less  than  15,000  can  march  two  hundred  miles 
into  the  very  heart  of  the  hostile  country,  and  with  less  than 
6000  can  take  and  hold  the  capital  of  the  nation,  a  city  of 
100,000  or  200,000  inhabitants,  and  dictate  a  peace,  taking 
as  much  territory  as  they  will  —  it  is  hardly  fair  to  dignify 
such  operations  with  the  name  of  war.  The  little  good 
which  a  long  contest  with  an  equal  might  produce  in  the 
conqueror,  is  wholly  lost.  Had  Mexico  been  a  strong  nation 
10* 


1 1 4  SERMON    OF 

we  should  never  have  had  this  conflict.  A  few  years  ago, 
when  General  Cass  wanted  a  war  with  England,  "  an  old- 
fashioned  war,"  and  declared  it  "  unavoidable,"  all  the  men 
of  property  trembled.  The  northern  men  thought  of  their 
mills  and  their  ships ;  they  thought  how  Boston  and  New 
York  would  look  after  a  war  with  our  sturdy  old  father  over 
the  sea ;  they  thought  we  should  lose  many  millions  of 
dollars  and  gain  nothing.  The  men  of  the  South,  who  have 
no  mills  and  no  ships  and  no  large  cities  to  be  destroyed, 
thought  of  their  "  peculiar  institution  ;  "  they  thought  of  a 
servile  war ;  they  thought  what  might  become  of  their 
slaves,  if  a  nation  which  gave  $100,000,000  to  emancipate 
her  bondmen  should  send  a  large  army  with  a  few  black 
soldiers  from  Jamaica ;  should  offer  money,  arms,  and 
freedom  to  all  who  would  leave  their  masters  and  claim 
their  unalienable  rights.  They  knew  the  southern  towns 
would  be  burnt  to  ashes,  and  the  whole  South,  from  Virginia 
to  the  Gulf,  would  be  swept  with  fire,  and  they  said, 
"  Don't."  The  North  said  so,  and  the  South ;  they  feared 
such  a  war,  with  such  a  foe.  Everybody  knows  the  effect 
which  this  fear  had  on  southern  politicians,  in  the  beginning 
of  this  century,  and  how  gladly  they  made  peace  with 
England  soon  as  she  was  at  liberty  to  turn  her  fleet  and  her 
army  against  the  most  vulnerable  part  of  the  nation.  I  am 
not  blind  to  the  wickedness  of  England  more  than  ignorant 
of  the  good  things  she  has  done  and  is  doing ;  a  Paradise  for 
the  rich  and  strong,  she  is  still  a  Purgatory  for  the  wise  and 
the  good,  and  the  Hell  of  the  poor  and  the  weak.  I  have 
no  fondness  for  war  anywhere,  and  believe  it  needless  and 
wanton  in  this  age  of  the  world,  surely  needless  and  wicked 
between  Father  England  and  Daughter  America ;  but  I  do 
solemnly  believe  that  the  moral  effect  of  such  an  old- 
fashioned  war  as  Mr.  Cass  in  1845  thought  unavoidable, 
would  have  been  better  than  that  of  this  Mexican  war.  It 
would  have  ended  slavery ;  ended  it  in  blood  no  doubt,  the 
worst  thing  to  blot  out  an  evil  with,  but  ended  it  and  forever. 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  115 

God  grant  it  may  yet  have  a  more  peaceful  termination. 
\Ve  should  have  lost  millions  of  property  and  thousands  of 
men,  and  then,  when  peace  came,  we  should  know  what  it 
was  worth ;  and  as  the  burnt  child  dreads  the  fire,  no  future 
President,  or  Congress,  or  Convention,  or  Party  would  talk 
much  in  favor  of  war  for  some  years  to  come. 

The  moral  effect  of  this  war  is  thoroughly  bad.  It  was 
unjust  in  the  beginning.  Mexico  did  not  pay  her  debts  ; 
but  though  the  United  States,  in  1783,  acknowledged  the 
British  claims  against  ourselves,  they  were  not  paid  till 
1803.  Our  claims  against  England,  for  her  depredations 
in  1793,  were  not  paid  till  1804;  our  claims  against  France, 
for  her  depredations  in  1806-13,  were  not  paid  us  till 
1834.  The  fact  that  Mexico  refused  to  receive  the  resident 
Minister  which  the  United  States  sent  to  settle  the  disputes, 
when  a  commissioner  was  expected  —  this  was  no  ground 
of  war.  We  have  lately  seen  a  British  ambassador  ordered 
to  leave  Spain  within  eight  and  forty  hours,  and  yet  the 
English  Minister  of  foreign  affairs,  Lord  Palmerston,  no 
new  hand  at  diplomacy,  declares  that  this  does  not  interrupt 
the  concord  of  the  two  nations !  We  treated  Mexico  con- 
temptuously before  hostilities  began ;  and  when  she  sent 
troops  into  a  territory  which  she  had  always  possessed, 
though  Texas  had  claimed  it,  we  declared  that  that  was 
an  act  of  war,  and  ourselves  sent  an  army  to  invade  her 
soil,  to  capture  her  cities,  and  seize  her  territory.  It  has 
been  a  war  of  plunder,  undertaken  for  the  purpose  of 
seizing  Mexican  territory,  and  extending  over  it  that  dismal 
curse  which  blackens,  impoverishes,  and  barbarizes  half  the 
Union  now,  and  swiftly  corrupts  the  other  half.  It  was  not 
enough  to  have  Louisiana  a  slave  territory  ;  not  enough  to 
make  that  institution  perpetual  in  Florida ;  not  enough  to 
extend  this  blight  over  Texas — we  must  have  yet  more 
slave  soil,  one  day  to  be  carved  into  Slave  States,  to  bind 
the  Southern  yoke  yet  more  securely  on  the  Northern  neck  ; 
to  corrupt  yet  more  the  politics,  literature,  and  morals  of 


116  SERMON    OF 

the  North.  The  war  was  unjust  at  its  beginning ;  mean  in 
its  motives,  a  war  without  honorable  cause  ;  a  war  for  plun- 
der ;  a  quarrel  between  a  great  boy  and  a  little  puny  weak- 
ling who  could  not  walk  alone,  and  cou'.d  hardly  stand. 
We  have  treated  Mexico  as  the  three  Northern  powers 
treated  Poland  in  the  last  century  —  stooped  to  conquer. 
Nay,  our  contest  has  been  like  the  English  seizure  of 
Ireland.  All  the  justice  was  on  one  side,  the  force,  skill, 
and  wealth  on  the  other. 

I  know  men  say  the  war  has  shown  us  that  Americans 
could  fight.  Could  fight !  —  almost  every  male  beast  will 
fight,  the  more  brutal  the  better.  The  long  war  of  the 
Revolution,  when  Connecticut,  for  seven  years,  kept  5000 
men  in  the  field,  showed  that  Americans  could  fight ;  Bun- 
ker Hill  and  Lexington  showed  that  they  could  fight,  even 
without  previous  discipline.  If  such  valor  be  a  merit,  I  am 
ready  to  believe  that  the  Americans,  in  a  great  cause  like 
that  of  Mexico,  to  resist  wicked  invasion,  would  fight  as 
men  never  fought  before.  A  republic  like  our  own,  where 
every  free  man  feels  an  interest  in  the  welfare  of  the 
nation,  is  full  of  the  elements  that  make  soldiers.  Is  that 
a  praise  ?  Most  men  think  so,  but  it  is  the  smallest  honor 
of  a  nation.  Of  all  glories,  military  glory,  at  its  best  estate, 
seems  the  poorest. 

Men  tell  us  it  shows  the  strength  of  the  nation ;  and 
some  writers  quote  the  opinions  of  European  kings  who, 
when  hearing  of  the  battles  of  Monterey,  Buena  Vista,  and 
Vera  Cruz,  became  convinced  that  we  were  "  a  great  peo- 
ple." Remembering  the  character  of  these  kings,  one  can 
easily  believe  that  such  was  their  judgment,  and  will  not 
sigh  many  times  at  their  fate,  but  will  hope  to  see  the  day 
when  the  last  king  who  can  estimate  a  nation's  strength 
only  by  its  battles,  has  passed  on  to  impotence  and  oblivion. 
The  power  of  America  —  do  we  need  proof  of  that  ?  I 
see  it  in  the  streets  of  Boston  and  New  York;  in  Lowell 
and  in  Lawrence ;  I  see  it  in  our  mills  and  our  ships ; 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  117 

I  read  it  in  those  letters  of  iron  written  all  over  the  North, 
where  he  may  read  that  runs ;  I  see  it  in  the  unconquered 
energy  which  tames  the  forest,  the  rivers,  and  the  ocean ; 
in  the  school-houses  which  lift  their  modest  roof  in  every 
village  of  the  North  ;  in  the  churches  that  rise  all  over  the 
freeman's  land  :  would  God  that  they  rose  higher,  pointing 
down  to  man  and  to  human  duties,  and  up  to  God  and 
immortal  life  !  I  see  the  strength  of  America  in  that  tide 
of  population  which  spreads  over  the  prairies  of  the  West, 
and,  beating  on  the  Rocky  Mountains,  dashes  its  peaceful 
spray  to  the  very  shores  of  the  Pacific  sea.  Had  we  taken 
150,000  men  and  $200,000,000,  and  built  two  railroads 
across  the  continent,  that  would  have  been  a  worthy  sign 
of  the  nation's  strength.  Perhaps  those  kings  could  not 
see  it ;  but  sensible  men  could  see  it  and  be  glad.  This 
waste  of  treasure  and  this  waste  of  blood  is  only  a  proof 
of  weakness.  War  is  a  transient  weakness  of  the  nation, 
but  slavery  a  permanent  imbecility. 

What  falsehood  has  this  war  produced  in  the-  executive 
and  legislative  power ;  in  both  parties,  whigs  and  demo- 
crats! I  always  thought  that  here  in  Massachusetts  the 
whigs  were  the  most  to  blame ;  they  tried  to  put  the  dis- 
grace of  the  war  on  the  others,  while  the  democratic  party 
coolly  faced  the  wickedness.  Did  far-sighted  men  know 
that  there  would  be  a  war  on  Mexico,  or  else  on  the  tariff 
or  the  currency,  and  prefer  the  first  as  the  least  evil  ? 

See  to  what  the  war  has  driven  two  of  the  most  famous 
men  of  the  nation :  one  wished  to  "  capture  or  slay  a 
Mexican ; "  *  the.  other  could  encourage  the  volunteers  to 
fight  a  war  which  he  had  denounced  as  needless,  "  a  war 
of  pretexts,"  and  place  the  men  of  Monterey  before  the 
men  of  Bunker  Hill ;  t  each  could  invest  a  son  in  that 

*  See  Jlr.  Clay's  speech  at  the  dinner  in  New  Orleans  on  Fore- 
fathers' day. 
f  See  Mr.  Webster's  speech  to  the  volunteers  at  Philadelphia. 


1  1 8  SERMON    OF 

unholy  cause.  You  know  the  rest:  the  fathers  ate  sour 
grapes,  and  the  children's  teeth  were  set  on  edge.  When 
a  man  goes  on  board  an  emigrant  ship,  reeking  with  filth 
and  fever,  not  for  gain,  not  for  "  glory,"  but  in  brotherly 
love,  catches  the  contagion,  and  dies  a  martyr  to  his  heroic 
benevolence,  men  speak  of  it  in  corners,  and  it  is  soon 
forgot ;  there  is  no  parade  in  the  streets ;  society  takes  little 
pains  to  do  honor  to  the  man.  How  rarely  is  a  pension 
given  to  his  widow  or  his  child ;  only  once  in  the  whole 
land,  and  then  but  a  small  sum.*  But  when  a  volunteer 
officer  —  for  of  the  humbler  and  more  excusable  men  that 
fall  we  take  no  heed,  war  may  mow  that  crop  of  "  vulgar 
deaths"  with  what  scythe  he  will  —  falls  or  dies  in  the 
quarrel  which  he  had  no  concern  in,  falls  in  a  broil  between 
the  two  nations,  your  newspapers  extol  the  man,  and  with 
martial  pomp,  "  sonorous  metal  blowing  martial  sounds," 
with  all  the  honors  of  the  most  honored  dead,  you  lay  away 
his  body  in  the  tomb.  Thus  is  it  that  the  nation  teaches 
these  little  ones,  that  it  is  better  to  kill  than  to  make  alive. 

I  know  there  are  men  in  the  army,  honorable  and  high- 
minded  men,  Christian  men,  who  dislike  war  in  general, 
and  this  war  in  special,  but  such  is  their  view  of  official 
duty,  that  they  obeyed  the  summons  of  battle,  though  with 
pain  and  reluctance.  They  knew  not  how  to  avoid  obe- 
dience. I  am  willing  to  believe  there  are  many  such.  But 
with  volunteers,  who,  of  their  own  accord,  came  forth 
to  enlist,  men  not  blinded  by  ignorance,  not  driven  by 
poverty  to  the  field,  but  only  by  hope  of  reward  —  what 
shall  be  said  of  them !  Much  may  be  said  to  excuse  the 
rank  and  file,  ignorant  men,  many  of  them  in  want — but 
for  the  leaders,  what  can  be  said  ?  Had  1  a  brother  who, 
in  the  day  of  the  nation's  extremity,  came  forward  with  a 
good  conscience,  and  perilled  his  life  on  the  battle-field, 
and  lost  it  "  in  the  sacred  cause  of  God  and  his  country," 
I  would  honor  the  man,  and  when  his  dust  came  home,  I 

*  A  case  of  this  sort  had  just  occurred  in  Boston. 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  119 

would  lay  it  away  with  his  fathers ;  with  sorrow  indeed,  but 
with  thankfulness  of  heart,  that  for  conscience'  sake  he 
was  ready  even  to  die.  But  had  I  a  brother  who,  merely 
for  his  pay,  or  hope  of  fame,  had  voluntarily  gone  down  to 
fight  innocent  men,  to  plunder  their  territory,  and  lost  his 
life  in  that  felonious  essay  —  in  sorrow  and  in  silence,  and 
in  secrecy,  would  I  lay  down  his  body  in  the  grave ;  I 
would  not  court  display,  nor  mark  it  with  a  single  stone. 

See  how  this  war  has  affected  public  opinion.  How 
many  of  your  newspapers  have  shown  its  true  atrocity ; 
how  many  of  the  pulpits  ?  Yet,  if  any  one  is  appointed 
to  tell  of  public  wrongs,  it  is  the  minister  of  religion.  The 
Governor  of  Massachusetts  *  is  an  officer  of  a  Christian 
church;  a  man  distinguished  for  many  excellences,  some 
of  them  by  no  means  common  :  it  is  said,  he  is  opposed  to 
the  war  in  private,  and  thinks  it  wicked ;  but  no  man  has 
lent  himself  as  a  readier  tool  to  promote  it.  The  Christian 
and  the  man  seem  lost  in  the  office,  in  the  Governor! 
What  a  lesson  of  falseness  does  all  this  teach  to  that  large 
class  of  persons  who  look  no  higher  than  the  example  of 
eminent  men  for  their  instruction.  You  know  what  com- 
plaints have  been  made,  by  the  highest  authority  in  the 
nation,  because  a  few  men  dared  to  speak  against  the  war. 
It  was  "  affording  aid  and  comfort  to  the  enemy."  If  the 
war-party  had  been  stronger,  and  feared  no  public  opinion, 
we  should  have  had  men  hanged  for  treason,  because  they 
spoke  of  this  national  iniquity !  Nothing  would  have  been 
easier.  A  "  gag  law  "  is  not  wholly  unknown  in  America. 

If  you  will  take  all  the  theft,  all  the  assaults,  all  the  cases 
of  arson,  ever  committed  in  time  of  peace  in  the  United 
States  since  the  settlement  of  Jamestown  in  1608,  and  add 
to  them  all  the  cases  of  violence  offered  to  woman,  with  all 
the  murders,  they  will  not  amount  to  half  the  wrongs  com- 
mitted in  this  war  for  the  plunder  of  Mexico.  Yet  the  cry 

*  Mr.  George  N.  Briggs. 


120  SERMON    OF 

has  been  and  still  is,  "  You  must  not  say  a  word  against  it ; 
if  you  do,  you  '  afford  aid  and  comfort  to  the  enemy.' "  Not 
tell  the  nation  that  she  is  doing  wrong  ?  What  a  miserable 
saying  is  that ;  let  it  come  from  what  high  authority  it  may, 
it  is  a  miserable  saying.  Make  the  case  your  own.  Suppose 
the  United  States  were  invaded  by  a  nation  ten  times  abler 
for  war  than  we  are,  with  a  cause  no  more  just,  intentions 
equally  bad ;  invaded  for  the  purpose  of  dismembering  our 
territory  and  making  our  own  New  England  the  soil  of 
slaves ;  would  you  be  still  ?  would  you  stand  and  look  on 
tamely  while  the  hostile  hosts,  strangers  in  language,  man- 
ners, and  religion,  crossed  your  rivers,  seized  your  ports, 
burnt  your  towns  ?  No,  surely  not.  Though  the  men  of 
New  England  would  not  be  able  to  resist  with  most  celestial 
love,  they  would  contend  with  most  manly  vigor ;  and  I 
should  rather  see  every  house  swept  clean  off  the  land,  and 
the  ground  sheeted  with  our  own  dead ;  rather  see  every 
man,  woman,  and  child  in  the  land  slain,  than  see  them 
tamely  submit  to  such  a  wrong :  and  so  would  you.  No, 
sacred  as  life  is  and  dear  as  it  is,  better  let  it  be  trodden  out 
by  the  hoof  of  war,  rather  than  yield  tamely  to  a  wrong. 
But  while  you  were  doing  your  utmost  to  repel  such  formida- 
ble injustice,  if  in  the  midst  of  your  invaders  men  rose  up 
and  said,  "  America  is  in  the  right,  and  brothers,  you  are 
wrong,  you  should  not  thus  kill  men  to  steal  their  land ; 
shame  on  you  !  "  how  should  you  feel  towards  such  ?  Nay,  in 
the  struggle  with  England,  when  our  fathers  perilled  every 
thing  but  honor,  and  fought  for  the  unalienable  rights  of 
man,  you  all  remember,  how  in  England  herself  there  stood 
up  noble  men,  and  with  a  voice  that  was  heard  above  the 
roar  of  the  populace,  and  an  authority  higher  than  the 
majesty  of  the  throne  they  said,  "You  do  a  wrong  ;  you 
may  ravage,  but  you  cannot  conquer.  If  I  were  an 
American,  while  a  foreign  troop  remained  in  my  land,  I 
would  never  lay  down  my  arms  ;  no,  never,  never,  never ! " 
But  I  wander  a  little  from  my  theme,  the  effect  of  the  war 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  121 

on  the  morals  of  the  nation.  Here  are  50,000  or  75,000 
men  trained  to  kill.  Hereafter  they  will  be  of  little  service 
in  any  good  work.  Many  of  them  were  the  off-scouring  of 
the  people  at  first.  Now  these  men  have  tasted  the  idleness, 
the  intemperance,  the  debauchery  of  a  camp  ;  tasted  of  its 
riot,  tasted  of  its  blood  !  They  will  come  home  before  long, 
hirelings  of  murder.  What  will  their  influence  be  as  fathers, 
husbands  ?  The  nation  taught  them  to  fight  and  plunder  the 
Mexicans  for  the  nation's  sake  ;  the  Governor  of  Massa- 
chusetts called  on  them  in  the  name  of  "  patriotism "  and 
u  humanity  "  to  enlist  for  that  work  :  but  if,  with  no  justice 
on  our  side,  it  is  humane  and  patriotic  to  fight  and  plunder 
the  Mexicans  on  the  nation's  account,  why  not  for  the  soldier 
to  fight  and  plunder  an  American  on  his  own  account  ? 
Ay,  why  not? — that  is  a  distinction  too  nice  for  common 
minds  ;  by  far  too  nice  for  mine. 

See  the  effect  on  the  nation.  We  have  just  plundered 
Mexico  ;  taken  a  piece  of  her  territory  larger  than  the 
thirteen  states  which  fought  the  Revolution,  a  hundred  times 
as  large  as  Massachusetts  ;  we  have  burnt  her  cities,  have 
butchered  her  men,  have  been  victorious  in  every  contest. 
The  Mexicans  were  as  unprotected  women,  we,  armed  men. 
See  how  the  lust  of  conquest  will  increase.  Soon  it  will  be 
the  ambition  of  the  next  President  to  extend  the  "  area  of 
freedom"  a  little  further  south  ;  the  lust  of  conquest  will 
increase.  Soon  we  must  have  Yucatan,  Central  America, 
all  of  Mexico,  Cuba,  Porto  Rico,  Hayti,  Jamaica — all  the 
islands  of  the  Gulf.  Many  men  would  gladly,  I  doubt  not, 
extend  the  "area  of  freedom"  so  as  to  include  the  free 
blacks  of  those  islands.  We  have  long  looked  with  jealous 
eyes  on  West  Indian  emancipation  —  hoping  the  scheme 
would  not  succeed.  How  pleasant  it  would  be  to  re-establish 
slavery  in  Hayti  and  Jamaica,  in  all  the  islands  whence  the 
gold  of  England  or  the  ideas  of  France  have  driven  it  out. 
If  the  South  wants  this,  would  the  North  object?  The 
possession  of  the  West  Indies  would  bring  much  money  to 
11 


SKKMON    OF 

New  England,  and  what  is  the  value  of  freedom  compared 
to  coffee  and  sugar,  and  cotton  ? 

I  must  say  one  word  of  the  effect  this  war  has  had  oil 
political  parties.  By  the  parties  I  mean  the  leaders  thereof, 
the  men  that  control  the  parties.  The  effect  on  the  demo- 
cratic party,  on  the  majority  of  Congress,  on  the  most 
prominent  men  of  the  nation,  has  been  mentioned  before. 
It  has  shut  their  eyes  to  truth  and  justice  ;  it  has  filled  their 
mouths  with  injustice  and  falsehood.  It  has  made  one  man 
"  available  "  for  the  Presidency  who  was  only  known  before 
as  a  sagacious  general,  that  fought  against  the  Indians  in 
Florida,  and  acquired  a  certain  reputation  by  the  use  of 
bloodhounds,  a  reputation  which  was  rather  unenviable  even 
in  America.  The  battles  in  northern  Mexico  made  him 
conspicuous,  and  now  he  is  seized  on  as  an  engine  to  thrust 
one  corrupt  party  out  of  power  and  to  lift  in  another  party, 
I  will  not  say  less  corrupt,  I  wish  I  could  ;  it  were  difficult  to 
think  it  more  so.  This  latter  party  has  been  conspicuous  for 
its  opposition  to  a  military  man  as  ruler  of  a  free  people  ; 
recently  it  has  been  smitten  with  sudden  admiration  for 
military  men,  and  military  success,  and  tells  the  people, 
without  a  blush,  that  a  military  man  fresh  from  a  fight  which 
he  disapproved  of,  is  most  likely  to  restore  peace,  "  because 
most  familiar  with  the  evils  of  war  "  !  In  Massachusetts  the 
prevalent  political  party,  as  such,  for  some  years  seems  to 
have  had  no  moral  principle  ;  however,  it  had  a  prejudice  in 
favor  of  decency :  now  it  has  thrown  that  overboard,  and 
has  not  even  its  respectability  left.  Where  are  its  "  Reso- 
lutions"? Some  men  knew  what  they  were  worth  long 
ago  ;  now  all  men  can  see  what  they  are  worth. 

The  cost  of  the  war  in  money  and  men  I  have  tried  to 
calculate,  but  the  effect  on  the  morals  of  the  people,  on  the 
press,  the  pulpit,  and  the  parties,  and  through  them  on  the 
rising  generation,  it  is  impossible  to  tell.  I  have  only  faintly 
sketched  the  outline  of  that.  The  effect  of  the  war  on 
Mexico  herself,  we  can  dimly  see  in  the  distance.  The 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  123 

Government  of  the  United  States  has  wilfully,  wantonly 
broken  the  peace  of  the  continent.  The  Revolutionary 
war  was  unavoidable  ;  but  for  this  invasion  there  is  no 
excuse.  That  God,  whose  providence  watches  over  the 
falling  nation  as  the  falling  sparrow,  and  whose  compre- 
hensive plans  arc  now  advanced  by  the  righteousness  and 
now  by  the  wrath  of  man,  —  He  who  stilleth  the  waves  of 
the  sea  and  the  tumult  of  the  people,  will  turn  all  this 
wickedness  to  account  in  the  history  of  man.  Of  that  I 
have  no  doubt.  But  that  is  no  excuse  for  American  crime. 
A  greater  good  lay  within  our  grasp,  and  we  spurned  it 
away. 

Well,  before  long  the  soldiers  will  come  back,  such  as 
shall  ever  come  —  the  regulars  and  volunteers,  the  husbands 
of  the  women  whom  your  charity  fed  last  winter,  housed 
and  clad  and  warmed.  They  will  come  back.  Come,  New 
England,  with  your  posterity  of  States,  go  forth  to  meet 
your  sons  returning  all  "covered  with  imperishable  honors." 
Come,  men,  to  meet  your  fathers,  brothers.  Come,  women, 
to  your  husbands  and  your  lovers ;  come.  But  what !  is 
that  the  body  of  men  who  a  year  or  two  ago  went  forth,  so 
full  of  valor  and  of  rum  ?  Are  these  rags  the  imperishable 
honors  that  covers  them  ?  Here  is  not  half  the  whole. 
Where  is  the  wealth  they  hoped  from  the  spoil  of  churches? 
But  the  men  —  "  Where  is  my  husband  ?  "  says  one  ;  "And 
my  son  ?  "  says  another.  "  They  fell  at  Jalapa,  one,  and 
one  at  Cerro  Gordo  ;  but  they  fell  covered  with  imperishable 
honor,  for  'twas  a  famous  victory."  "  Where  is  my  lover  ?  " 
screams  a  woman  whom  anguish  makes  respectable  spite  of 
her  filth  and  ignorance  ;  —  "  And  our  father,  where  is  he  ?  " 
scream  a  troop  of  half-starved  children,  staring  through  their 
dirt  and  rags.  "  One  died  of  the  vomit  at  Vera  Cruz. 
Your  father,  little  ones,  we  scourged  the  naked  man  to  death 
at  Mixcoac." 

But  that  troop  which  is  left,  who  are  in  the  arms  of  wife 
and  child,  they  are  the  best  sermon  against  war ;  this  has  lost 


124  SERMON    OF 

an  arm  and  that  a  leg ;  half  are  maimed  in  battle,  or  sickened 
with  the  fever;  all  polluted  with  the  drunkenness,  idleness, 
debauchery,  lust,  and  murder  of  a  camp.  Strip  off  this 
man's  coat,  and  count  the  stripes  welted  into  his  flesh, 
stripes  laid  on  by  demagogues  that  love  the  people,  "  the  dear 
people ! "  See  how  affectionately  the  war-makers  branded  the 
"  dear  soldiers  "  with  a  letter  D,  with  a  red-hot  iron,  in  the 
cheek.  The  flesh  will  quiver  as  the  irons  burn  ;  no  matter : 
It  is  only  for  love  of  the  people  that  all  this  is  done,  and  we 
^ire  all  of  us  covered  with  imperishable  honors !  D  stands 
for  deserter,  —  aye,  and  for  demagogue — yes,  and  for 
demon  too.  Many  a  man  shall  come  home  with  but  half  of 
himself,  half  his  body,  less  than  half  his  soul. 

"  Alas  the  mother,  that  him  bare, 
If  she  could  stand  in  presence  there, 
In  that  wan  cheek  and  wasted  air, 
She  would  not  know  her  child." 

"  Better,"  you  say,  "  for  us  better,  and  for  themselves 
better  by  far,  if  they  had  left  that  remnant  of  a  body  in  the 
common  ditch  where  the  soldier  finds  his  '  bed  of  honor ; ' 
better  have  fed  therewith  the  vultures  of  a  foreign  soil,  than 
thus  come  back."  No,  better  come  back,  and  live  here, 
mutilated,  scourged,  branded,  a  cripple,  a  pauper,  a  drunkard, 
and  a  felon ;  better  darken  the  windows  of  the  jail  and  blot 
the  gallows  with  unusual  shame,  to  teach  us  all  that  such  is 
war,  and  such  the  results  of  every  "  famous  victory,"  such 
the  imperishable  honors  that  it  brings,  and  how  the  war- 
makers  love  the  men  they  rule  ! 

Oh  Christian  America !  Oh  New  England,  child  of  the 
Puritans!  Cradled  in  the  wilderness,  thy  swaddling  gar- 
ments stained  with  martyrs'  blood,  hearing  in  thy  youth  the 
war-whoop  of  the  savage  and  thy  mother's  sweet  and  soul- 
composing  hymn : 

"  Hush,  my  child,  lie  still  and  slumber, 

Holy  angels  guard  thy  bed  ; 
Heavenly  blessings,  without  number, 
Rest  upon  thine  infant  head : " 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  125 

Come,  New  England,  take  the  old  banners  of  thy  con- 
quering host,  the  standards  borne  at  Monterey,  Palo  Alto, 
Buena  Vista,  Vera  Cruz,  the  "  glorious  stripes  and  stars  " 
that  waved  over  the  walls  of  Churubusco,  Contreras,  Puebla, 
Mexico  herself,  flags  blackened  with  battle  and  stiffened  with 
blood,  pierced  by  the  lances  and  torn  with  the  shot ;  bring 
them  into  thy  churches,  hang  them  up  over  altar  and  pulpit, 
and  let  little  children,  clad  in  white  raiment  and  crowned 
with  flowers,  come  and  chant  their  lessons  for  the  day : 

"  Blessed  are  the  pure  in  heart,  for  they  shall  see  God. 

"  Blessed  are  the  peacemakers,  for  they  shall  be  called 
the  children  of  God." 

Then  let  the  priest  say,  "  Righteousness  exalteth  a  nation, 
but  sin  is  a  reproach  unto  any  people.  Blessed  is  the  Lord 
my  strength,  which  teacheth  my  hands  to  war,  and  my 
fingers  to  fight.  Happy  is  that  people  that  is  in  such  a  case. 
Yea,  happy  is  that  people  whose  God  is  the  Lord,  and  Jesus 
Christ  their  Saviour." 

Then  let  the  soldiers  who  lost  their  limbs  and  the  women 
who  lost  their  husbands  and  their  lovers  in  the  strife,  and  the 
men  —  wiser  than  the  children  of  light  —  who  made  money 
out  of  the  war ;  let  all  the  people,  like  people  and  like 
priest,  say  "  Amen." 

But  suppose  these  men  were  to  come  back  to  Boston  on  a 
day  when,  in  civil  style,  as  having  never  sinned  yourself, 
and  never  left  a  man  in  ignorance  and  want  to  be  goaded 
into  crime,  you  were  about  to  hang  three  men  —  one  for 
murder,  one  for  robbery  with  the  armed  hand,  and  one  for 
burning  down  a  house.  Suppose,  after  the  fashion  of  "  the 
good  old  times,"  you  were  to  hang  those  men  in  public,  and 
lead  them  in  long  procession  through  your  streets,  and  while 
you  were  welcoming  these  returned  soldiers  and  taking  their 
officers  to  feast  in  "  the  Cradle  of  Liberty,"  they  should 
meet  the  sheriff's  procession  escorting  those  culprits  to  the 
gallows.  Suppose  the  warriors  should  ask,  "  Why,  what  is 
11* 


126  SERMON    OF 

that  ?  "  What  would  you  say  ?  Why,  this.  "  These  men, 
they  broke  the  law  of  God,  by  violence,  by  fire  and  blood, 
and  we  shall  hang  them  for  the  public  good,  and  especially 
for  the  example,  to  teach  the  ignorant,  the  low,  and  the 
weak."  Suppose  those  three  felons,  the  halters  round  their 
neck,  should  ask  also,  "  Why,  Vvhat  is  that  ?  "  You  would 
say,  "  They  are  the  soldiers  ju^t  come  back  from  war.  For 
two  long  years  they  have  been  hard  at  work,  burning  cities, 
plundering  a  nation,  and  butchering  whole  armies  of  men. 
Sometimes  they  killed  a  thousand  in  day.  By  their  help, 
the  nation  has  stolen  seven  hundred  thousand  square  miles 
of  land  !  "  Suppose  the  culprits  ask,  "  Where  will  you  hang 
so  many  ?  "  "  Hang  them !  "  is  the  answer,  "  we  shall  only 
hang  you.  It  is  written  in  our  Bible  that  one  murder  makes 
a  villain,  millions  a  hero.  We  shall  feast  these  men  full  of 
bread  and  wine ;  shall  take  their  leader,  a  rough  man  and  a 
ready,  one  who  by  perpetual  robbery  holds  a  hundred  slaves 
and  more,  and  make  him  a  king  over  all  the  land.  But  as 
you  only  burnt,  robbed,  and  murdered  on  so  small  a  scale, 
and  without  the  command  of  the  President  or  the  Congress, 
we  shall  hang  you  by  the  neck.  Our  Governor  ordered 
these  men  to  go  and  burn  and  rob  and  kill ;  now  he  orders 
you  to  be  hanged,  and  you  must  not  ask  any  more  questions, 
for  the  hour  is  already  come." 

To  make  the  whole  more  perfect  —  suppose  a  native  of 
Loo-Choo,  converted  to  Christianity  by  your  missionaries  in 
his  native  land,  had  come  hither  to  have  "  the  way  of  God  " 
"  expounded  unto  him  more  perfectly,"  that  he  might  see 
how  these  Christians  love  one  another.  Suppose  he  should 
be  witness  to  a  scene  like  this ! 

To  men  who  know  the  facts  of  war,  the  wickedness  of 
this  particular  invasion  and  its  wide-extending  consequences, 
I  fear  that  my  words  will  seem  poor  and  cold  and  tame.  I 
have  purposely  mastered  my  emotion,  telling  only  my 
thought.  I  have  uttered  no  denunciation  against  the  men 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  127 

who  caused  this  destruction  of  treasure,  this  massacre  of 
men,  this  awful  degradation  of  the  moral  sense.  The 
respectable  men  of  Boston  — "  the  men  of  property  and 
standing"  all  over  the  State,  the  men  that  commonly  control 
the  politics  of  New  England,  tell  you  that  they  dislike 
the  war.  But  they  re-elect  the  men  who  made  it.  Has  a 
single  man  in  all  New-England  lost  his  seat  in  any  office 
because  he  favored  the  war  ?  Not  a  man.  Have  you  ever 
known  a  northern  merchant  who  would  not  let  his  ship  for 
the  war,  because  the  war  was  wicked  and  he  a  Christian  ? 
Have  you  ever  known  a  northern  manufacturer  who  would 
not  sell  a  kernel  of  powder,  nor  a  cannon-ball,  nor  a  coat, 
nor  a  shirt  for  the  war  ?  Have  you  ever  known  a  capitalist, 
a  man  who  lives  by  letting  money,  refuse  to  lend  money  for 
the  war  because  the  war  was  wicked  ?  Not  a  merchant, 
not  a  manufacturer,  not  a  capitalist.  A  little  money  —  it 
can  buy  up  whole  hosts  of  men.  Virginia  sells  her  negroes; 
what  does  New  England  sell  ?  There  was  once  a  man  in 
Boston,  a  rich  man  too,  not  a  very  great  man,  only  a  good 
one  who  loved  his  country,  and  there  was  another  poor  man 
here,  in  the  times  that  tried  men's  souls,  —  but  there  was  not 
money  enough  in  all  England,  not  enough  promise  of 
honors,  to  make  Hancock  and  Adams  false  to  their  sense  of 
right.  Is  our  soil  degenerate,  and  have  we  lost  the  breed  of 
noble  men  ? 

No,  I  have  not  denounced  the  men  who  directly  made  the 
war,  or  indirectly  egged  the  people  on.  Pardon  me,  thou 
prostrate  Mexico,  robbed  of  more  than  half  thy  soil,  that 
America  may  have  more  slaves ;  thy  cities  burned,  thy 
children  slain,  the  streets  of  thy  capital  trodden  by  the  alien 
foot,  but  still  smoking  with  thy  children's  blood  ;  pardon  me 
if  I  seem  to  have  forgotten  thee.  And  you,  ye  butchered 
Americans,  slain  by  the  vomito,  the  gallows,  and  the  sword  ; 
you,  ye  maimed  and  mutilated  men,  who  shall  never  again 
join  hands  in  prayer,  never  kneel  to  God  once  more  upon 
the  limbs  he  made  you ;  you,  ye  widows,  orphans  of  these 


128  SERMON    OF 

butchered  men,  far  off  in  that  more  sunny  South,  here  in  our 
own  fair  land,  pardon  me  that  I  seem  to  forget  your  wrongs. 
And  thou,  my  Country,  my  own,  my  loved,  my  native  land, 
thou  child  of  great  ideas  and  mother  of  many  a  noble  son, 
dishonored  now,  thy  treasure  wasted,  thy  children  killed  or 
else  made  murderers,  thy  peaceful  glory  gone,  thy  Govern- 
ment made  to  pimp  and  pander  for  lust  of  crime,  forgive 
me  that  I  seem  over-gentle  to  the  men  who  did  and  do  the 
damning  deed  which  wastes  thy  treasure,  spills  thy  blood, 
and  stains  thine  honor's  sacred  fold.  And  you,  ye  sons  of 
men  everywhere,  thou  child  of  God,  Mankind,  whose  latest, 
fairest  hope  is  planted  here  in  this  new  world,  —  forgive  me 
if  I  seem  gentle  to  thy  enemies,  and  to  forget  the  crime  that 
so  dishonors  man,  and  makes  this  ground  a  slaughter-yard 
of  men  —  slain,  too,  in  furtherance  of  the  basest  wish!  I 
have  no  words  to  tell  the  pity  that  I  feel  for  them  that  did 
the  deed.  I  only  say,  "  Father,  forgive  them,  for  they  know 
full  well  the  sin  they  do  !  " 

A  sectarian  church  could  censure  a  General  for  holding 
his  candle  in  a  Catholic  cathedral ;  it  was  "  a  candle  to  the 
Pope  "  yet  never  dared  to  blame  the  war.  While  we  loaded 
a  ship  of  war  with  corn  and  sent  off  the  Macedonian  to  Cork, 
freighted  by  private  bounty  to  feed  the  starving  Irishman, 
the  State  sent  her  ships  to  Vera  Cruz,  in  a  cause  most 
unholy,  to  bombard,  to  smite,  and  to  kill.  Father!  forgive 
the  State  ;  forgive  the  church.  It  was  an  ignorant  State.  It 
was  a  silent  church — a  poor,  dumb  dog,  that  dared  not 
bark  at  the  wolf  who  prowls  about  the  fold,  but  only  at  the 
lamb. 

Yet  ye  leaders  of  the  land,  know  this,  —  that  the  blood  of 
thirty  thousand  men  cries  out  of  the  ground  against  you. 
Be  it  your  folly  or  your  crime,  still  cries  the  voice,  "  Where 
is  thy  brother  ?  "  That  thirty  thousand  —  in  the  name  of 
humanity  I  ask,  "  Where  are  they  ?  "  In  the  name  of  justice  I 
answer,  "  You  slew  them." 

It  was  not  the  people  who  made  this  war.     They  have 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  129 

often  enough  done  a  foolish  thing.  But  it  was  not  they 
who  did  this  wrong.  It  was  they  who  led  the  people  :  it 
was  demagogues  that  did  it.  Whig  demagogues  and  dema- 
gogues of  the  democrats ;  men  that  flatter  the  ignorance, 
the  folly,  or  the  sin  of  the  people,  that  they  might  satisfy 
their  own  base  purposes.  In  May,  1846,  if  the  facts  of 
the  case  could  have  been  stated  to  the  voters,  and  the  ques- 
tion put  to  the  whole  mass  of  the  people,  "  Shall  we  go 
down  and  fight  Mexico,  spending  two  hundred  million  of 
dollars,  maiming  four  and  twenty  thousand  men,  and  butch- 
ering thirty  thousand  ;  shall  we  rob  her  of  half  her  terri- 
tory ?  "  —  the  lowest  and  most  miserable  part  of  the  nation 
would  have  said  as  they  did  say,  "  Yes; "  the  demagogues 
of  the  nation  would  have  said  as  they  did  say,  "  Yes  ;  "  per- 
haps a  majority  of  the  men  of  the  South  would  have  said  so, 
for  the  humanity  of  the  nation  lies  not  there ;  but  if  it  had 
been  brought  to  the  great  mass  of  the  people  at  the  North, 
—  whose  industry  and  skill  so  increase  the  national  wealth, 
whose  intelligence  and  morals  have  given  the  nation  its 
character  abroad,  —  then  they,  the  great  majority  of  the 
land,  would  have  said  "No.  We  will  have  no  war.  If  we 
want  more  land,  we  will  buy  it  in  the  open  market,  and 
pay  for  it  honestly.  But  we  are  not  thieves,  nor  murderers, 
thank  God,  and  will  not  butcher  a  nation  to  make  a  slave- 
field  out  of  her  soil."  The  people  would  not  have  made 
this  war. 

Well,  we  have  got  a  new  territory,  enough  to  make  one 
hundred  States  of  the  size  of  Massachusetts.  That  is  not 
all.  We  have  beaten  the  armies  of  Mexico,  destroyed  the 
little  strength  she  had  left,  the  little  self-respect,  else  she 
would  not  so  have  yielded  and  given  up  half  her  soil  for  a 
few  miserable  dollars.  Soon  we  shall  take  the  rest  of  her 
possessions.  How  can  Mexico  hold  them  now  —  weakened, 
humiliated,  divided  worse  than  ever  within  herself.  Before 
many  years,  all  of  this  northern  continent  will  doubtless  be 


130  SERMON    OF 

in  the  hands  of  the  Anglo  Saxon  race.  That  of  itself  is 
not  a  thing  to  mourn  at.  Could  we  have  extended  our  em- 
pire there  by  trade,  by  the  Christian  arts  of  peace,  it  would 
be  a  blessing  to  us  and  to  Mexico  ;  a  blessing  to  the  world. 
But  we  have  done  it  in  the  worst  way,  by  fraud  and  blood  ; 
for  the  worst  purpose,  to  steal  soil  and  convert  the  cities  of 
men  into  the  shambles  for  human  flesh  ;  have  done  it  at  the 
bidding  of  men  whose  counsels  long  have  been  a  scourge 
and  a  curse  —  at  the  bidding  of  slaveholders.  They  it  is  that 
rule  the  land,  fill  the  offices,  buy  up  the  North  with  the 
crumbs  that  fall  from  their  political  table,  make  the  laws, 
declare  hostilities,  and  leave  the  North  to  pay  the  bill. 
Shall  we  ever  waken  out  of  our  sleep  ;  shall  we  ever  re- 
member the  duties  we  owe  to  the  world  and  to  God,  who 
put  us  here  on  this  new  continent  ?  Let  us  not  despair. 

Soon  we  shall  have  all  the  southern  part  of  the  continent, 
perhaps  half  the  islands  of  the  Gulf.  One  thing  remains 
to  do — that  is,  with  the  new  soil  we  have  taken  to  extend 
order,  peace,  education,  religion  ;  to  keep  it  from  the  blight, 
the  crime,  and  the  sin  of  slavery.  That  is  for  the  nation 
to  do  ;  for  the  North  to  do.  God  knows  the  South  will 
never  do  it.  Is  there  manliness  enough  left  in  the  North  to 
do  that  ?  Has  the  soil  forgot  its  wonted  faith,  and  borne  a 
different  race  of  men  from  those  who  struggled  eight  long 
years  for  freedom  ?  Do  we  forget  our  sires,  forget  our 
God  ?  In  the  day  when  the  monarchs  of  Europe  are 
shaken  from  their  thrones ;  when  the  Russian  and  the 
Turk  abolish  slavery;  when  cowardly  Naples  awakes  from 
her  centuries  of  sleep,  and  will  have  freedom  ;  when  France 
prays  to  become  a  Republic,  and  in  her  agony  sweats  great 
drops. of  blood;  while  the  Tories  of  the  world  look  on  and 
mock  and  wag  their  heads;  and  while  the  Angel  of  Hope 
descends  with  trusting  words  to  comfort  her,  shall  America 
extend  slavery  ?  butcher  a  nation  to  get  soil  to  make  a  field 
for  slaves  ?  I  know  how  easily  the  South  can  buy  office- 
hunters  ;  whig  or  democrat,  the  price  is  still  the  same. 


THE    MEXICAN    WAR.  131 

The  same  golden  eagle  blinds  the  eyes  of  each.  But  can 
she  buy  the  people  of  the  North  ?  Is  honesty  gone,  and 
honor  gone,  your  love  of  country  gone,  religion  gone,  and 
nothing  manly  left ;  not  even  shame  ?  Then  let  us  perish  ; 
let  the  Union  perish !  No,  let  that  stand  firm,  and  let  the 
Northern  men  themselves  be  slaves ;  and  let  us  go  to  our 
masters  and  say,  "  You  are  very  few,  and  we  are  very 
many  ;  we  have  the  wealth,  the  numbers,  the  intelligence, 
the  religion  of  the  land ;  but  you  have  the  power,  do  not 
be  hard  upon  us ;  pray  give  us  a  little  something,  some 
humble  offices,  or  if  not  these  at  least  a  tariff*,  and  we  will 
be  content." 

Slavery  has  already  been  the  blight  of  this  nation,  the 
curse  of  the  North  and  the  curse  of  the  South.  It  has 
hindered  commerce,  manufactures,  agriculture.  It  con- 
founds your  politics.  It  has  silenced  your  ablest  men.  It 
has  muzzled  the  pulpit,  and  stifled  the  better  life  out  of  the 
press.  It  has  robbed  three  million  men  of  what  is  dearer 
than  life  ;  it  has  kept  back  the  welfare  of  seventeen  millions 
more.  You  ask,  oh  Americans,  where  is  the  harmony  of 
the  Union  ?  It  was  broken  by  slavery.  Where  is  the 
treasure  we  have  wasted  ?  It  was  squandered  by  slavery. 
Where  are  the  men  we  sent  to  Mexico  ?  They  were  mur- 
dered by.  slavery  ;  and  now  the  slave  power  comes  forward 
to  put  her  new  minions,  her  thirteenth  President,  upon  the 
nation's  neck  !  Will  the  North  say  "  Yes  "  ? 

But  there  is  a  Providence  which  rules  the  world,  —  a  plan 
in  His  affairs.  Shall  all  this  war,  this  aggression  of  the 
slave  power  be  for  nothing  ?  Surely  not.  Let  it  teach  us 
two  things :  Everlasting  hostility  to  slavery ;  everlasting 
love  of  Justice  and  of  its  Eternal  Right.  Then,  dear  as  we 
may  pay  for  it,  it  may  be  worth  what  it  has  cost  —  the 
money  and  the  men.  I  call  on  you,  ye  men  —  fathers, 
brothers,  husbands,  sons,  to  learn  this  lesson,  and,  when 
duty  calls,  to  show  that  you  know  it  —  know  it  by  heart  and 
at  your  fingers'  ends.  And  you,  ye  women  —  mothers, 


132  SERMON    OF    THE    MEXICAN    WAR. 

sisters,  duughters,  wives,  I  cull  cm  you  to  teach  this  lesson  to 
your  children,  and  let  them  know  that  such  a  war  is  siq,  and 
slavery  sin,  and,  while  you  teach  them  to  hate  both,  teach 
them  to  be  men,  and  do  the  duties  of  noble,  Christian,  and 
manly  men.  Behind  injustice  there  is  ruin,  and  above  man 
there  is  the  everlasting  God. 


VI. 


A    SERMON    OF  THE  PERISHING    CLASSES   IN   BOSTON.      PREACHED    AT 
THE  MELODEON,  ON   SUNDAY,   AUGUST  30,   1846. 


MATTHEW   XTII1.   14. 

IT    18    SOT    TRK    WILL    OF    OCR    FATHER    WHICH    IS    IS    HB1VBN,    THAT    ONE    OF    THtSE 
LITTLE   OSES   SHOULD   PEIISH. 

THERE  are  two  classes  of  men  who  are  weak  and  little  : 
one  is  little  by  nature,  consisting  of  such  as  are  born  witli 
feeble  powers,  not  strongly  capable  of  self-help  ;  the  other 
is  little  by  position,  comprising  men  that  are  permanently 
poor  and  ignorant.  When  Jesus  said,  It  is  not  God's  will 
that  one  of  these  little  ones  should  perish,  I  take  it  he  in- 
cluded both  these  classes  —  men  little  by  nature,  and  men 
little  by  position.  Furthermore,  I  take  it  he  said  what  is 
true,  that  it  is  not  God's  will  one  of  these  little  ones  should 
perish.  Now,  a  man  may  be  said  to  perish  when  he  is  ruined, 
or  even  when  he  fails  to  attain  the  degree  of  manhood  he 
might  attain  under  the  average  circumstances  of  this  present 
age,  and  these  present  men.  In  a  society  like  ours,  and  that 
of  all  nations  at  this  time,  as  hitherto,  with  such  a  history,  a 
history  of  blood  and  violence,  cunning  and  fraud ;  resting 
on  such  a  basis  —  a  basis  of  selfishness  ;  a  society  wherein 
there  is  a  preference  of  the  mighty,  and  a  postponement  of 
the  righteous,  where  power  is  worshipped  and  justice  little 
honored,  though  much  talked  of,  it  comes  to  pass  that  a 
great  many  little  ones  from  both  these  classes  actually 
perish.  If  Jesus  spoke  the  truth,  then  they  perish  contrary 
12 


134  SERMON    OF    THE 

to  the  will  of  God,  and,  of  course,  by  some  other  will 
adverse  to  the  will  of  God.  In  a  society  where  the  natural 
laws  of  the  body  are  constantly  violated,  where  many  men 
are  obliged  by  circumstances  to  violate  them,  it  follows 
unavoidably  that  many  are  born  little  by  nature,  and  they 
transmit  their  feebleness  to  their  issue.  The  other  class, 
men  little  by  position,  are  often  so  hedged  about  with  diffi- 
culties, so  neglected,  that  they  cannot  change  their  condition ; 
they  bequeath  also  their  littleness  to  their  children.  Thus 
the  number  of  little  ones  enlarges  with  the  increase  of 
society.  This  class  becomes  perpetual ;  a  class  of  men 
mainly  abandoned  by  the  Christians. 

In  all  forms  of  social  life  hitherto  devised  these  classes 
have  appeared,  and  it  has  been  a  serious  question,  What 
shall  be  done  with  them  ?  Seldom  has  it  been  the  question, 
What  shall  be  done  for  them  ?  In  olden  time  the  Spartans 
took  children  born  with  a  weak  or  imperfect  body,  children 
who  would  probably  be  a  hindrance  to  the  nation,  and  threw 
them  into  a  desert  place  to  be  devoured  by  the  wild  beasts, 
and  so  settled  that  question.  At  this  day,  the  Chinese,  I  am 
told,  expose  such  children  in  the  streets  and  beside  the 
rivers,  to  the  humanity  of  passers  by  ;  and  not  only  such, 
but  sound,  healthy  children,  none  the  less,  who,  though 
strong  by  nature,  are  born  into  a  weak  position.  Many  of 
them  are  left  to  die,  especially  the  boys.  But  some  are 
saved,  those  mainly  girls.  I  will  not  say  they  are  saved  by 
the  humanity  of  wealthier  men.  They  become  slaves,  de- 
voted by  their  masters  to  a  most  base  and  infamous  purpose. 
With  the  exception  of  criminals,  these  abandoned  daughters 
of  the  poor,  form,  it  is  said,  the  only  class  of  slaves  in  that 
great  country. 

Neither  the  Chinese  nor  the  Spartan  method  is  manly  or 
human.  It  does  with  the  little  ones,  not  for  them.  It  does 
away  with  them,  and  that  is  all.  I  will  not  decide  which  is 
the  worst  of  the  two  modes,  the  Chinese  or  the  Spartan. 
We  are  accustomed  to  call  both  these  nations  heathen,  and 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  135 

take  it  for  granted  they  do  not  know  it  is  God's  will  that  not 
one  of  these  little  ones  should  perish.  Be  that  as  it  may, 
we  do  not  call  ourselves  heathen  ;  we  pretend  to  know  the 
will  of  God  in  this  particular.  Let  us  look,  therefore,  and 
see  how  we  have  disposed  of  the  little  ones  in  Boston,  what 
we  are  doing  for  them  or  with  them. 

Let  me  begin  with  neglected  and  abandoned  children. 
We  all  know  how  large  and  beautiful  a  provision  is  made  for 
the  public  education  of  the  people.  About  a  fourth  part  of 
the  city  taxes  are  for  the  public  schools.  Yet  one  not  familiar 
with  this  place  is  astonished  at  the  number  of  idle,  vagrant 
boys  and  girls  in  the  streets.  It  appears  from  the  late  census 
of  Boston,  that  there  are  4948  children  between  four  and 
fifteen,  who  attend  no  school.  I  am  not  speaking  of  truants, 
occasional  absentees,  but  of  children  whose  names  are  not 
registered  at  school,  permanent  absentees.  If  we  allow 
that  1948  of  these  are  kept  in  some  sort  of  restraint  by 
their  parents,  and  have,  or  have  had,  some  little  pains  taken 
with  their  culture  at  home  ;  that  they  are  feeble  and  do  not 
begin  to  attend  school  so  early  as  most,  or  that  they  are 
precocious,  and  complete  their  studies  before  fifteen,  or  for 
some  other  good  reason  are  taken  from  school,  and  put  to 
some  useful  business,  there  still  remain  3000  children  who 
never  attend  any  school,  turned  loose  into  your  streets! 
Suppose  there  is  some  error  in  the  counting,  that  the  number 
is  overstated  one  third,  still  there  are  left  2000  young 
vagrants  in  the  streets  of  Boston ! 

What  will  be  the  fate  of  these  2000  children  ?  Some 
men  are  superior  to  circumstances ;  so  well  born  they  defy 
ill  breeding.  There  may  be  children  so  excellent  and  strong 
they  cannot  be  spoiled.  Surely  there  are  some  who  will 
learn  with  no  school ;  boys  of  vast  genius,  whom  you  can- 
not keep  from  learning.  Others  there  are  of  wonderful 
moral  gifts,  whom  no  circumstances  can  make  vulgar ;  they 
will  live  in  the  midst  of  corruption  and  keep  clean  through 


136  SERMON    OF    THE 

the  innate  refinement  of  a  wondrous  soul.  Out  of  these 
2000  children  there  may  be  two  of  this  sort ;  it  were 
foolish  to  look  for  more  than  one  in  a  thousand.  The  1997 
depend  mainly  on  circumstances  to  help  them;  yes, to  make 
their  character.  Send  them  to  school  and  they  will  learn. 
Give  them  good  precepts,  good  examples,  they  will  also 
become  good.  Give  them  bad  precepts,  bad  examples,  and 
they  become  wicked.  Send  them  half  clad  and  uncared  for 
into  your  streets,  and  they  grow  up  hungry  savages,  greedy 
for  crime. 

What  have  these  abandoned  children  to  help  them  ? 
Nothing,  literally  nothing!  They  are  idle,  though  their 
bodies  crave  activity.  They  are  poor,  ill-clad,  and  ill-fed. 
There  is  nothing  about  them  to  foster  self-respect ;  nothing 
to  call  forth  their  conscience,  to  awaken  and  cultivate  their 
sense  of  religion.  They  find  themselves  beggars  in  the 
wealth  of  a  city ;  idlers  in  the  midst  of  its  work.  Yes, 
savages  in  the  midst  of  civilization.  Their  consciousness  is 
that  of  an  outcast,  one  abandoned  and  forsaken  of  men.  In 
cities,  life  is  intense  amongst  all  classes.  So  the  passions 
and  appetites  of  such  children  are  strong  and  violent.  Their 
taste  is  low ;  their  wants  clamorous.  Are  religion  and  con- 
science there  to  abate  the  fever  of  passion  and  regulate 
desire  ?  The  moral  class  and  the  cultivated  shun  these  poor 
wretches,  or  look  on  with  stupid  wonder.  Our  rule  is  that 
the  whole  need  the  physician,  not  the  sick.  They  are  left 
almost  entirely  to  herd  and  consort  with  the  basest  of  men  ; 
they  are  exposed  early  and  late  to  the  worst  influences,  and 
their  only  comrades  are  men  whom  the  children  of  the  rich 
are  taught  to  shun  as  the  pestilence.  To  be  poor  is  hard 
enough  in  the  country,  where  artificial  wants  are  few,  and 
those  easily  met,  where  all  classes  are  humbly  clad,  and 
none  fare  sumptuously  every  day.  But  to  be  poor  in  the 
city,  where  a  hundred  artificial  desires  daily  claim  satis- 
faction, and  where,  too,  it  is  difficult  for  the  poor  to  satisfy 
the  natural  and  unavoidable  wants  of  food  and  raiment ;  to 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  137 

be  hungry,  ragged,  dirty,  amid  luxury,  wantonness  and 
refinement ;  to  be  miserable  in  the  midst  of  abundance,  that 
is  hard  beyond  all  power  of  speech.  Look,  I  will  not  say 
at  the  squalid  dress  of  these  children,  as  you  see  them 
prowling  about  the  markets  and  wharves,  or  contending  in 
the  dirty  lanes  and  by-places  into  which  the  pride  of  Boston 
has  elbowed  so  much  of  her  misery  ;  look  at  their  faces ! 
Haggard  as  they  are,  meagre  and  pale  and  wan,  want  is  not 
the  worst  thing  written  there,  but  cunning,  fraud,  violence 
and  obscenity,  and  worst  of  all,  fear  ! 

Amid  all  the  science  and  refined  culture  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  these  children  learn  little ;  little  that  is  good,  much 
that  is  bad.  In  the  intense  life  around  them,  they  unavoid- 
ably become  vicious,  obscene,  deceitful  and  violent.  They 
will  lie,  steal,  be  drunk.  How  can  it  be  otherwise  ? 

If  you  could  know  the  life  of  one  of  those  poor  lepers  of 
Boston,  you  would  wonder,  and  weep.  Let  me  take  one  of 
them  at  random  out  of  the  mass.  He  was  born,  unwelcome, 
amid  wretchedness  and  want.  His  coming  increased  both. 
Miserably  he  struggles  through  his  infancy,  less  tended  than 
the  lion's  whelp.  He  becomes  a  boy.  He  is  covered  only 
with  rags,  and  those  squalid  with  long  accumulated  filth. 
He  wanders  about  your  streets,  too  low  even  to  seek  em- 
ployment, now  snatching  from  a  gutter  half  rotten  fruit 
which  the  owner  flings  away.  He  is  ignorant ;  he  has 
never  entered  a  school-house ;  to  him  even  the  alphabet  is 
a  mystery.  He  is  young  in  years,  yet  old  in  misery. 
There  is  no  hope  in  his  face.  He  herds  with  others  like 
himself,  low,  ragged,  hungry  and  idle.  If  misery  loves 
company,  he  finds  that  satisfaction.  Follow  him  to  his 
home  at  night;  he  herds  in  a  cellar;  in  the  same  sty  with 
father,  mother,  brothers,  sisters,  and  perhaps  yet  other  fami- 
lies of  like  degree.  What  served  him  for  dress  by  day, 
is  his  only  bed  by  night. 

Well,  this  boy  steals  some  trifle,  a  biscuit,  a  bit  of  rope, 
or  a  knife  from  a  shop-window,  he  is  seized  and  carried 


138  SERMON    OF    THE 

to  jail.  The  day  comes  for  trial.  He  is  marched  through 
the  streets  in  handcuffs,  the  companion  of  drunkards  and 
thieves,  thus  deadening  the  little  self-respect  which  Nature 
left  even  in  an  outcast's  bosom.  He  sits  there  chained  like 
a  beast ;  a  boy  in  irons !  the  sport  and  mockery  of  men 
vulgar  as  the  common  sewer.  His  trial  comes.  Of  course 
he  is  convicted.  The  show  of  his  countenance  is  witness 
against  him.  His  rags  and  dirt,  his  ignorance,  his  vagrant 
habits,  his  idleness,  all  testify  against  him.  That  face  so 
young,  and  yet  so  impudent,  so  sly,  so  writ  all  over  with 
embryo  villany,  is  evidence  enough.  The  jury  are  soon 
convinced,  for  they  see  his  temptations  in  his  look,  and 
surely  know  that  in  such  a  condition  men  will  steal :  yes, 
they  themselves  would  steal.  The  judge  represents  the 
law,  and  that  practically  regards  it  a  crime  even  for  a  boy  to 
be  weak  and  poor.  Much  of  our  common  law,  it  seems 
to  me,  is  based  on  might,  not  right.  So  he  is  hurried  off 
to  jail  at  a  tender  age,  and  made  legally  the  companion  of 
felons.  Now  the  State  has  him  wholly  in  her  power ;  by 
that  rough  adoption,  has  made  him  her  own  child,  and 
sealed  the  indenture  with  the  jailor's  key.  His  handcuffs 
are  the  symbol  of  his  sonship  to  the  State.  She  shuts  him 
in  her  college  for  the  Little.  What  does  that  teach  him  ; 
science,  letters ;  even  morals  and  religion  ?  Little  enough 
of  this,  even  in  Boston,  and  in  most  counties  of  Massachu- 
setts, I  think  nothing  at  all,  not  even  a  trade  which  he  can 
practise  when  his  term  expires !  I  have  been  told  a  story, 
and  1  wish  it  might  be  falsely  told,  of  a  boy,  in  this  city,  of 
sixteen,  sent  to  the  house  of  correction  for  five  years  because 
he  stole  a  bunch  of  keys,  and  coming  out  of  that  jail  at 
twenty-one,  unable  to  write,  or  read,  or  calculate,  and  with 
no  trade  but  that  of  picking  oakum.  Yet  he  had  been  five 
years  the  child  of  the  State,  and  in  that  college  for  the 
poor!  Who  would  employ  such  a  youth;  with  such  a 
reputation ;  with  the  smell  of  the  jail  in  his  very  breath  ? 
Not  your  shrewd  men  of  business,  they  know  the  risk  ; 


PERISHING    CLASSKS    IN    BOSTON.  139 

not  your  rcspecctable  men,  members  of  churches  and  all 
that ;  not  they  !  Why  it  would  hurt  a  man's  reputation  for 
piety  to  do  good  in  that  way.  Besides,  the  risk  is  great, 
and  it  argues  a  great  deal  more  Christianity  than  it  is  popular 
to  have,  for  a  respectable  man  to  employ  such  a  youth.  He 
is  forced  back  into  crime  again.  I  say,  forced,  for  honest 
men  will  not  employ  him  when  the  State  shoves  him  out 
of  the  jail.  Soon  you  will  have  him  in  the  court  again,  to 
be  punished  more  severely.  Then  he  goes  to  the  State- 
prison,  and  then  again,  and  again,  till  death  mercifully  ends 
his  career ! 

Who  is  to  blame  for  all  that  ?  I  will  ask  the  best  man 
among  the  best  of  you,  what  he  would  have  become,  if  thus 
abandoned,  turned  out  in  childhood,  and  with  no  culture, 
into  the  streets,  to  herd  with  the  wickedest  of  men  !  Some- 
body says,  there  are  "  organic  sins "  in  society  which 
nobody  is  to  blame  for.  But  by  this  sin  organized  in  soci- 
ety, these  vagrant  children  are  training  up  to  become  thieves, 
pirates  and  murderers.  I  cannot  blame  them.  But  there  is 
a  terrible  blame  somewhere,  for  'it  is  not  the  will  of  God 
that  one  of  these  little  ones  should  perish.  Who  is  it  that 
organizes  the  sin  of  society  ? 

Let  us  next  look  at  the  parents  of  these  vagrants,  at  tho 
adult  poor.  It  is  not  easy  or  needed  for  this  purpose,  to 
define  very  nicely  the  limits  of  a  class,  and  tell  where  the 
rich  end,  and  the  poor  begin.  However,  men  may,  in 
reference  to  this  matter,  be  divided  into  three  classes.  Tho 
first  acts  on  society  mainly  by  their  capital ;  the  second 
mainly  by  their  skill,  mental  and  manual,  by  educated 
labor  ;  and  the  third  by  their  muscles,  by  brute  force  with 
little  or  no  skill,  uneducated  labor.  The  poor,  I  take  it, 
come  mainly  from  this  latter  class.  Education  of  head  or 
hand,  a  profession  or  a  trade,  is  wealth  in  possibility;  yes, 
wealth  in  prospect,  wealth  in  its  process  of  accumulation, 
for  wealth  itself  is  only  accumulated  labor,  as  learning  is 


]40  SERMON    OF    THE 

accumulated  thought.  Most  of  our  rich  men  have  come 
out  of  this  class  which  acts  by  its  skill,  and  their  children 
in  a  few  years  will  return  to  it.  I  am  not  now  to  speak  of 
men  transiently  poor,  who  mend  their  condition  as  the  hours 
go  by,  who  may  gain  enough,  and  perhaps  become  rich ; 
but  of  men  permanently  poor,  whom  one  year  finds  want- 
ing, and  the  next  leaves  no  better  off;  men  that  live,  as  we 
say,  from  hand  to  mouth,  but  whose  hand  and  mouth  are 
often  emply.  Even  here  in  Boston,  there  is  little  of  the 
justice  that  removes  causes  of  poverty,  though  so  much  of 
the  charity  which  alleviates  its  effects.  Those  men  live, 
if  you  can  call  it  life,  crowded  together  more  densely,  I 
am  told,  than  in  Naples  or  Paris,  in  London  or  Liverpool. 
Boston  has  its  ghetto,  not  for  the  Jews  as  at  Prague  and  at 
Rome,  but  for  brother  Christians.  In  the  quarters  inhabited 
mainly  by  the  "poor,  you  find  a  filthiness  and  squalor  which 
would  astonish  a  stranger.  The  want  of  comfort,  of  air, 
of  water,  is  terrible.  Cold  is  a  stern  foe  in  our  winters,  but 
in  these  places,  I  am  told  that  men  suffer  more  from  want 
of  water  in  summer,  than  want  of  fire  in  winter.*  If  your 
bills  of  mortality  were  made  out  so  as  to  show  the  deaths 
in  each  ward  of  the  city,  I  think  all  would  be  astonished  at 
the  results.  Disease  and  death  are  the  result  of  causes, 
causes  too  that  may  for  a  long  time  be  avoided,  and  in  the 
more  favored  classes  are  avoided.  It  is  not  God's  will  that 
the  rich  be  spared  and  the  poor  die.  Yet  the  greatest 
mortality  is  always  among  the  poor.  Out  of  each  hundred 
Catholics  who  died  in  Boston,  from  1833  to  1838,  more 
than  sixty-one  were  less  than  five  years  of  age.  The  result 
for  the  last  six  years  is  no  better.  Of  one  hundred  children 
born  amongst  them,  only  thirty-eight  live  five  years ;  only 
eleven  become  fifty !  Gray-haired  Irishmen  we  seldom 
see.  Yet  they  are  not  worse  off  than  others  equally  poor, 

*  This  evil  is  now  happily  removed,  and  all  men  rejoice  in  a 
cheap  and  abundant  supply  of  pure  water. 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  141 

only  we  can  more  distinctly  get  at  the  facts.  In  the  war 
with  disease,  which  mankind  is  waging,  the  poor  stand  in 
front  of  the  fire,  and  are  mowed  down  without  pity ! 

Of  late  years,  in  Boston,  there  has  been  a  gradual  in- 
crease in  the  mortality  of  children.*  I  think  we  shall  find 
the  increase  only  among  the  children  of  the  poor.  Of 
course  it  depends  on  causes  which  may  be  removed,  at 
least  modified,  for  the  average  life  of  mankind  is  on  the 
increase.  I  am  told,  I  know  not  if  the  authority  be  good, 
that  mortality  among  the  poor  is  greater  in  Boston  than  in 
any  city  of  Europe.  • 

Of  old  times  the  rrch  man  rode  into  battle,  shirted  with 
mail,  covered  and  shielded  with  iron  from  head  to  foot. 
Arrows  glanced  from  him  as  from  a  stone.  He  came  home 
unhurt  and  covered  with  "  glory."  But  the  poor,  in  his 
leathern  jerkin  or  his  linen  frock,  confronted  the  war,  where 
every  weapon  tore  his  unprotected  flesh.  In  the  modem, 
perennial  battle  with  disease,  the  same  thing  takes  place ; 
the  poor  fall  and  die. 

The  destruction  of  the  poor  is  their  poverty.  They  are 
ignorant,  not  from  choice  but  necessity.  They  cannot, 
therefore,  look  round  and  see  the  best  way  of  doing  things, 
of  saving  their  strength,  and  sparing  their  means.  They 
can  have  little  of  what  we  call  thrift,  the  brain  in  the  hand, 
for  which  our  people  are  so  remarkable.  Some  of  them 
are  also  little  by  nature,  ill-born;  others  well  born  enough, 
were  abandoned  in  childhood,  and  have  not  since  been  able 
to  make  up  the  arrears  of  a  neglected  youth.  They  are  to 
fight  the  great  battle  of  life,  for  battle  it  is  to  them,  with 
feeble  arms.  Look  at  the  houses  they  live  in,  without  com- 
fort or  convenience,  without  sun,  or  air,  or  water ;  damp, 
cold,  filthy  and  crowded  to  excess.  In  one  section  of  the 
city  there  are  thirty-seven  persons  on  an  average  in  each 
house. 

*  See  the  valuable  tables  and  remarks,  by  Mr.  Shattuck,  in  his 
Census  of  Boston,  pp.  136-  177. 


142  SERMON    OF    THE 

Consider  the  rents  paid  by  this  class  of  our  brothers.  It 
is  they  who  pay  the  highest  rate  for  their  dwellings.  The 
worth  of  the  house  is  often  little  more  than  nothing,  the 
ground  it  covers  making  the  only  value.  I  am  told  that 
twelve  or  fifteen  per  cent,  a  year  on  a  large  valuation  is 
quite  commonly  paid,  and  over  thirty  per  cent,  on  the  actual 
value,  is  not  a  strange  thing.  I  wish  this  might  not  prove 
true. 

But  the  misery  of  the  poor  does  not  end  with  their 
wretched  houses  and  exorbitant  rent.  Having  neither  cap- 
ital nor  store-room,  they  must  purchase  articles  of  daily 
need  in  the  smallest  quantities.  They  buy,  therefore,  at  the 
greatest  disadvantage,  and  yet  at  the  dearest  rates.  I  am 
told  it  is  not  a  rare  thing  for  them  to  buy  inferior  qualities 
of  flour  at  six  cents  a  pound,  or  $11.88  a  barrel,  while  an- 
other man  buys  a  month's  supply  at  a  time  for  $4  or  $5  a 
barrel. .  This  may  be  an  extreme  case,  but  I  know  that  in 
some  places  in  this  city,  an  inferior  article  is  now  retailed  to 
them  atH$7.92  the  barrel.  So  it  is  with  all  kinds  of  food  ; 
they  are  bought  in  the  smallest  quantities,  and  at  a  rate 
which  a  rich  man  would  think  ruinous.  Is  not  the  poor  man, 
too,  most  often  cheated  in  the  weight  and  the  measure  ?  So 
it  is  whispered.  "  He  has  no  friends,"  says  the  sharper  ; 
"  others  have  broken  him  to  fragments,  I  will  grind  him  to 
powder  !  "  And  the  grinding  comes. 

Such  being  the  case,  the  poor  man  finds  it  difficult  to  get 
a  cent  beforehand.  I  know  rich  men  tell  us  that  capital 
is  at  the  mercy  of  labor.  That  may  be  prophecy ;  it  is  not 
history  ;  not  fact.  Uneducated  labor,  brute  force  without 
skill,  is  wholly  at  the  mercy  of  capital.  The  capitalist  can 
control  the  market  for  labor,  which  is  all  the  poor  man  has 
to  part  with.  The  poor  cannot  combine  as  the  rich.  True, 
a  mistake  is  sometimes  made,  and  the  demand  for  labor  is 
greater  than  the  supply,  and  the  poor  man's  wages  are  in- 
creased. This  result  was  doubtless  God's  design,  but  was 
it  man's  intention  ?  The  condition  of  the  poor  has  hitherto 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  143 

been  bettered,  not  so  much  by  the  design  of  the  strong,  as 
by  God  making  their  wrath  and  cupidity  serve  the  weak. 

Under  such  circumstances,  what  marvel  that  the  poor 
man  becomes  unthrifty,  reckless,  and  desperate  ?  I  know 
how  common  it  is  to  complain  of  the  extravagance  of  the 
poor.  Often  there  is  reason  for  the  complaint.  It  is  a  wrong 
thing,  and  immoral,  for  a  man  with  a  dependent  family  to 
spend  all  his  earnings,  if  it  be  possible  to  live  with  less.  I 
think  many  young  men  are  much  to  be  blamed,  for  squan- 
dering all  their  wages  to  please  a  dainty  palate,  or  to  dress 
as  fine  as  a  richer  man,  making  only  the  heart  of  their 
tailor  foolishly  glad.  Such  men  may  not  be  poor  now,  but 
destine  themselves  to  be  the  fathers  of  poor  children.  After 
making  due  allowance,  it  must  be  confessed,  that  much  of 
the  recklessness  of  the  poor  comes  unavoidably  from  their 
circumstances ;  from  their  despair  of  ever  being  comforta- 
ble, except  for  a  moment  at  a  time.  Every  one  knows  that 
unmerited  wealth  tempts  a  man  to  squander,  while  few  men 
know,  what  is  just  as  true,  that  hopeless  poverty  does  the 
same  thing.  As  the  tortured  Indian  will  sleep,  if  his  tor- 
mentor pause  but  a  moment,  so  the  poor  man,  grown  reck- 
less and  desperate,  forgets  the  future  storms,  and  wastes  in 
revel  the  solitary  gleam  of  sunlight  which  falls  on  him. 
It  is  nature  speaking  through  his  soul. 

Now  consider  the  moral  temptations  before  such  men. 
Here  is  wealth,  food,  clothing,  comfort,  luxury,  gold,  the 
great  enchanter  of  this  age,  and  but  a  plank  betwixt  it  and 
them.  Nay,  they  are  shut  from  it  only  by  a  pane  of  glass 
thin  as  popular  justice,  and  scarcely  less  brittle  !  They 
feel  the  natural  wants  of  man  ;  the  artificial  wants  of  men 
in  cities.  They  are  indignant  at  their  social  position,  thrust 
into  the  mews  and  the  kennels  of  the  land.  They  think 
some  one  is  to  blame  for  it.  A  man  in  New  England  does 
not  believe  it  God's  will  he  should  toil  for  ever,  stinting  and 
sparing  only  to  starve  the  more  slowly  to  death,  overloaded 
with  work,  with  no  breathing  time  but  the  blessed  Sunday. 


144  SERMON    OK    THK 

They  see  others  doing  nothing,  idle  as  Solomon's  lilies,  yet 
wasting  the  unearned  bread  God  made  to  feed  the  children 
of  the  poor.  They  see  crowds  of  idle  women  elegantly  clad, 
a  show  of  loveliness,  a  rainbow  in  the  streets,  and  think  of 
the  rag  which  does  not  hide  their  daughter's  shame.  They 
hear  of  thousands  of  baskets  of  costly  wine  imported  in  a 
single  ship,  not  brought  to  recruit  the  feeble,  but  to  poison 
the  palate  of  the  strong.  They  begin  to  ask  if  wealthy  men 
and  wise  men  have  not  forgotten  their  brothers,  in  thinking 
of  their  own  pleasure  !  It  is  not  the  poor  alone  who  ask  that. 
In  the  midst  of  all  this,  what  wonder  is  it  if  they  feel  desirous 
of  revenge  ;  what  wonder  that  stores  and  houses  are  .broken 
into,  and  stables  set  afire  !  Such  is  the  natural  effect  of 
misery  like  that ;  it  is  but  the  voice  of  our  brother's  blood 
crying  to  God  against  us  all.  I  wonder  not  that  it  cries  in 
robbery  and  fire.  The  jail  and  the  gallows  will  not  still  that 
voice,  nor  silence  the  answer.  I  wonder  at  the  fewness  of 
crimes,  not  their  multitude.  I  must  say  that,  if  goodness  and 
piety  did  not  bear  a  greater  proportion  to  the  whole  devel- 
opment of  the  poor  than  the  rich,  their  crimes  would  be 
tenfold.  The  nation  sets  the  poor  an  example  of  fraud, 
by  making  them  pay  highest  on  all  local  taxes ;  of  theft, 
by  levying  the  national  revenue  on  persons,  not  property. 
Our  navy  and  army  set  them  the  lesson  of  violence  ;  and, 
to  complete  their  schooling,  at  this  very  moment  we*are  rob- 
bing another  people  of  cities  and  lands,  stealing,  burning,  and 
murdering,  fox  lust  of  power  and  gold.  Everybody  knows 
that  the  political  action  of  a  nation  is  the  mightiest  educa- 
tional influence  in  that  nation.  But  such  is  the  doctrine  the 
State  preaches  to  them,  a  constant  lesson  of  fraud,  theft, 
violence  and  crime.  The  literature  of  the  nation  mocks  at 
the  poor,  laughing  in  the  popular  journals  at  the  poor  man's 
inevitable  crime.  Our  trade  deals  with  the  poor  as  tools, 
not  men.  What  wonder  they  feel  wronged  !  Some  city 
missionary  may  dawdle  the  matter  as  he  will ;  tell  them  it 
is  God's  will  they  should  be  dirty  and  ignorant,  hungry,  cold 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  145 

and  naked.  Now  and  then  a  poor  woman  starving  with 
cold  and  hunger  may  think  it  true.  But  the  poor  know 
better  ;  ignorant  as  they  are,  they  know  better.  Great 
Nature  speaks  when  you  and  I  are  still.  They  feel  neg- 
lected, wronged,  and  oppressed.  What  hinders  them  from 
following  the  example  set  by  the  nation,  by  society,  by  the 
strong  ?  Their  inertness,  their  cowardice,  and,  what  does 
not  always  restrain  abler  men,  their  fear  of  God !  With 
cultivated  men,  the  intellect  is  often  developed  at  the  ex- 
pense of  conscience  and  religion.  With  the  poor  this  is 
more  seldom  the  case. 

The  misfortunes  of  the  poor  do  not  end  here.  To  make 
their  degradation  total,  their  name  infamous,  we  have  shut 
them  out  of  our  churches.  Once  in  our  Puritan  meeting- 
houses, there  were  "  body  seats"  for  the  poor ;  for  a  long 
time  free  galleries,  where  men  sat  and  were  not  ashamed. 
Now  it  is  not  so.  A  Christian  society  about  to  build  a 
church,  and  having  850,000,  does  not  spend  $40,000  for 
that,  making  it  a  church  for  all,  and  keep  810,000  as  a 
fund  for  the.  poor.  No,  it  borrows  830,000  more,  and  then 
shuts  the  poor  out  of  its  bankrupt  aisles.  A  high  tower,  or 
a  fine-toned  bell,  yes,  marble  and  mahogany,  are  thought 
better  than  the  presence  of  these  little  ones  whom  God  wills 
not  to  perish.  I  have  heard  ministers  boast  of  the  great 
men,  and* famous,  who  sat  under  their  preaching  ;  never  one 
who  boasted  that  the  poor  came  into  his  church,  and  were 
fed,  body  and  soul !  You  go  to  our  churches  —  the  poor 
are  not  in  them.  They  are  idling  and  lounging  away  their 
day  of  rest,  like  the  horse  and  the  ox.  Alas  me,  that  the 
apostles,  that  the  Christ  himself  could  not  worship  in  our 
churches,  till  he  sold  his  garment  and  bought  a  pew  !  Many 
of  our  houses  of  public  worship  would  be  well  named, 
"Churches  for  the  affluent."  Yet  religion  is  more  to  the 
poor  man  than  to  the  rich.  What  wonder  then,  if  the  poor 
lose  self-respect,  when  driven  from  the  only  churches  where 
it  is  thought  respectable  to  pray  ! 
13 


146  SERMON    OF    THE 

This  class  of  men  are  perishing  ;  yes,  perishing  in  the 
nineteenth  century  ;  perishing  in  Boston,  wealthy,  charitable 
Boston ;  perishing  soul  and  body,  contrary  to  God's  will ; 
and  perishing  all  the  worse  because  they  die  slow,  and  cor- 
rupt by  inches.  As  things  now  are,  their  mortality  is  hardly 
a  curse.  The  Methodists  are  right  in  telling  them  this 
world  is  a  valley  of  tears ;  it  is  almost  wholly  so  to  them  ; 
and  Heaven  a  long  June  day,  full  of  rest  and  plenty.  To 
die  is  their  only  gain  ;  their  only  hope.  Think  of  that,  you 
who  murmur  because  money  is  "  tight,"  because  your  in- 
vestment gives  only  twenty  per  cent,  a  year,  or  because  you 
are  taxed  for  half  your  property,  meaning  to  move  off  next 
season  ;  think  of  that,  you  who  complain  because  the  dem- 
ocrats are  in  power  to-day,  and  you  who  tremble  lest  the 
whigs  shall  be  in  '49  ;  think  of  that,  you  who  were  never 
hungry,  nor  athirst ;  who  are  sick,  because  you  have 
nothing  else  to  do,  and  grumble  against  God,  from  mere 
emptiness  of  soul,  and  for  amusement's  sake  ;  think  of  men 
who,  if  wise,  do  not  dare  to  raise  the  human  prayer  for  life, 
but  for  death,  as  the  only  gain,  the  only  hope,  and  you  will 
give  over  your  complaint,  your  hands  stopping  your  mouth. 

What  shall  become  of  the  children  of  such  men  ?  They 
stand  in  the  fore-front  of  the  battle,  all  unprotected  as  they 
are ;  a  people  scattered  and  peeled,  only  a  miserable 
remnant  reaches  the  age  of  ten  !  Look  about  your  streets, 
and  see  what  does  become  of  such  as  live,  vagrant  and  idle 
boys.  Ask  the  police,  the  constables,  the  jails ;  they  shall 
tell  you  what  becomes  of  the  sons.  Will  a  white  lily  grow 
in  a  common  sewer;  can  you  bleach  linen  in  a  tan-pit? 
Yes,  as  soon  as  you  can  rear  a  virtuous  population,  under 
such  circumstances.  Go  to  any  State  Prison  in  the  land, 
and  you  shall  find  that  seven-eighths  of  the  convicts  came 
from  this  class,  brought  there  by  crimes  over  which  they 
had  no  control ;  crimes  which  .would  have  made  you  and  me 
thieves  and  pirates.  The  characters  of  such  men  are  made 
for  them,  far  more  than  by  them.  There  is  no  more  vice, 


PERISHING    CLASSES    ITT  BOSTON.  14? 

perhaps,  born  into  that  class  ;  they  have  no  more  "  inherited 
sin  "  than  any  other  class  in  the  land  ;  all  the  difference, 
then,  between  the  morals  and  manners  of  rich  and  poor,  is 
the  result  of  education  and  circumstances. 

The  fate  of  the  daughters  of  the  poor  is  yet  worse.  Many 
of  them  are  doomed  to  destruction  by  the  lust  of  men,  their 
natural  guardians  and  protectors.  Think  of  an  able,  "  re- 
spectable "  man,  comfortable,  educated  and  "  Christian," 
helping  debase  a  woman,  degrade  her  in  his  eyes,  her  eyes, 
the  eyes  of  the  world  !  Why  it  is  bad  enough  to  enslave  a 
man,  but  thus  to  enslave  a  woman  —  I  have  no  words  to 
speak  of  that.  The  crime  and  sin,  foul,  polluting  and 
debasing  all  it  touches,  has  come  here  to  curse  man  and 
woman,  the  married  and  the  single,  and  the  babe  unborn ! 
It  seems  to  me  as  if  I  saw  the  Genius  of  this  city  stand 
before  God,  lifting  his  hands  in  agony  to  heaven,  crying  for 
mercy  on  woman,  insulted  and  trodden  down,  for  vengeance 
on  man,  who  treads  her  thus  infamously  into  the  dust.  The 
vengeance  comes,  not  the  mercy.  Misery  in  woman  is  the 
strongest  inducement  to  crime.  Where  self-respect  is  not 
fostered ;  where  severe  toil  hardly  holds  her  soul  and  body 
together  amid  the  temptations  of  a  city,  and  its  heated  life, 
it  is  no  marvel  to  me  that  this  sin  should  slay  its  victims, 
finding  woman  an  easy  prey. 

Let  me  follow  the  children  of  the  poor  a  step  further  —  I 
mean  to  the  jail.  Few  men  seem  aware  of  the  frightful 
extent  of  crime  amongst  us,  and  the  extent  of  the  remedy, 
more  awful  yet.  In  less  than  one  year,  namely,  from  the 
9th  of  June,  1845,  to  the  2d  of  June,  1846,  there  were 
committed  to  your  House  of  Correction,  in  this  city,  1228 
persons,  a  little  more  than  one  out  of  every  fifty-six  in  the 
whole  population  that  is  more  than  ten  years  old.  Of  these 
377  were  women ;  851  men.  Five  were  sentenced  for  an 
indefinite  period,  and  forty-seven  for  an  additional  period  of 
solitary  imprisonment.  In  what  follows,  I  make  no  account 
of  that.  But  the  whole  remaining  period  of  their  sentences 


148  SERMON    OF    THE 

amounts  to  more  than  544  years,  or  198,568  days.  In 
addition  to  this,  in  the  year  ending  with  June  9th,  1846,  we 
sent  from  Boston  to  the  State  Prison,  thirty-five  more,  and 
for  a  period  of  18,595  days,  of  which  205  were  solitary. 
Thus  it  appears  that  the  illegal  and  convicted  crime  of 
Boston,  in  one  year,  was  punished  by  imprisonment  for  217, 
63  days.  Now  as  Boston  contains  but  114,366  persons  of 
all  ages,  and  only  69,112  that  are  over  ten  years  of  age,  it 
follows  that  the  imprisonment  of  citizens  of  Boston  for  crime 
in  one  year,  amounts  to  more  than  one  day  and  twenty-one 
hours,  for  each  man,  woman,  and  child,  or  to  more  than 
three  days  and  three  hours,  for  each  one  over  ten  years  of 
age.  This  seems  beyond  belief,  yet  in  making  the  estimate, 
I  have  not  included  the  time  spent  in  jail  before  sentence ;  I 
have  left  out  the  solitary  imprisonment  in  the  House  of  Cor- 
rection ;  I  have  said  nothing  of  the  169  children,  sentenced 
for  crime  to  the  House  of  Reformation  in  the  same  period. 

What  is  the  effect  of  this  punishment  on  society  at  large  ? 
I  will  not  now  attempt  to  answer  that  question.  What«is  it 
on  the  criminals  themselves  ?  Let  the  jail-books  answer. 
Of  the  whole  number,  202  were  sentenced  for  the  second 
time  ;  131  for  the  third  ;  101  for  the  fourth  ;  38  for  the  fifth  ; 
40  for  the  sixth  ;  29  for  the  seventh  ;  23  for  the  eight ;  12 
for  the  ninth ;  50  for  the  tenth  time,  or  more  ;  and  of  the 
criminals  punished  for  the  tenth  time,  31  were  women  !  Of 
the  35  sent  to  the  State  Prison,  14  had  been  there  before ;  of 
the  1228  sent  to  the  House  of  Correction,  only  626  were 
sent  for  the  first  time. 

There  are  two  classes,  the  victims  of  society,  and  the  foes 
of  society,  the  men  that  organize  its  sins,  and  then  tell  us 
nobody  is  to  blame.  May  God  deal  mercifully  with  the  foes ; 
I  had  rather  take  my  part  with  the  victims.  Yet  is  there  one 
who  wishes  to  be  a  foe  to  mankind  ? 

Here  are  the  sons  of  the  poor,  vagrant  in  your  streets, 
shut  out  by  their  misery  from  the  culture  of  the  age  ;  growing 
up  to  fill  your  jails,  to  be  fathers  of  a  race  like  themselves, 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  149 

and  to  be  huddled  into  an  infamous  grave.  Here  are  the 
daughters  of  the  poor,  cast  out  and  abandoned,  the  parias  of 
our  civilization,  training  up  fora  life  of  shame  and  pollution, 
and  coming  early  to  a  miserable  end.  Here  are  the  poor, 
daughters  and  sons,  excluded  from  the  refining  influences 
of  modern  life,  shut  out  of  the  very  churches  by  that  bar  of 
gold,  ignorant,  squalid,  hungry  and  hopeless,  wallowing  in 
their  death  !  Are  these  the  results  of  modern  civilization  ; 
this  in  the  midst  of  the  nineteenth  century,  in  a  Christian 
city  full  of  churches  and  gold ;  this  in  Boston,  which  adds 
§13,000,000  a  year  to  her  actual  wealth  ?  Is  that  the  will 
of  God  ?  Tell  it  not  in  China ;  whisper  it  not  in  New 
Holland,  lest  the  heathen  turn  pale  with  horror,  and  send 
back  your  missionaries,  fearing  they  shall  pollute  the  land  ! 

There  is  yet  another  class  of  little  ones.  I  mean  the 
intemperate.  Within  the  last  few  years  it  seems  that  drunk- 
enness has  increased.  I  know  this  is  sometimes  doubted. 
But  if  this  fact  is  not  shown  by  the  increased  number  of 
legal  convictions  for  the  crime,  it  is  by  the  sight  of  drunken 
men  in  public  and  not  arrested.  I  think  I  have  not  visited 
the  city  five  times  in  the  last  ten  months  without  seeing 
more  or  less  men  drunk  in  the  streets.  The  cause  of  this 
increase  it  seems  to  me  is  not  difficult  to  discover.  All 
great  movements  go  forward  by  undulations,  as  the  waves 
of  the  rising  tide  come  up  the  beach.  Now  comes  a  great 
wave  reaching  far  up  the  shore,  and  then  recedes.  The 
next,  and  the  next,  and  the  next  falls  short  of  the  highest 
mark  ;  yet  the  tide  is  coming  in  all  the  while.  You  see  this 
same  undulation  in  other  popular  movements ;  for  example, 
in  politics.  Once  the  great  wave  of  democracy  broke  over 
the  central  power,  washing  it  clean.  Now  the  water  lies 
submissive  beneath  that  rock,  and  humbly  licks  its  feet.  In 
some  other  day  the  popular  wave  shall  break  with  purifying 
roar  clean  over  that  haughty  stone  and  wash  off  the  lazy 
barnacles,  heaps  of  corrupting  drift-weed,  and  deadly  mon- 
13* 


J50  SERMON    OF    THE 

sters  of  the  deep.  By  such  seemingly  unsteady  movements 
do  popular  affairs  get  forward.  The  reformed  drunkards,  it 
is  said,  were  violent,  ill-bred,  theatrical,  and  only  touched 
the  surface.  Many  respectable  men  withdrew  from  the 
work  soon  as  the  Washingtonians  came  to  it.  It  was  a  pity 
they  did  so;  but  they  did.  I  think  the  conscience  of  New 
England  did  not  trust  the  reformed  men  ;  that  also  is  a  pity. 
They  seem  now  to  have  relaxed  their  efforts  in  a  great 
measure,  perhaps  discouraged  at  the  coldness  with  which 
they  have  in  some  quarters  been  treated.  I  know  not  why 
it  is,  but  they  do  not  continue  so  ably  the  work  they  once 
begun.  Besides,  the  State,  it  was  thought,  favored  intem- 
perance. It  was  for  a  long  time  doubted  if  the  license-laws 
were  constitutional ;  so  they  were  openly  set  at  nought,  for 
wicked  men  seize  on  doubtful  opportunities.  Then,  too, 
temperance  had  gone,  a  few  years  ago,  as  far  as  it  could  be 
expected  to  go  until  certain  great  obstacles  were  removed. 
Many  leading  men  in  the  land  were  practically  hostile  to 
temperance,  and,  with  some  remarkable  exceptions,  still  are. 
The  sons  of  the  prilgrims,  last  Forefathers'  day,  could  not 
honor  the  self-denial  of  the  Puritans  without  wine  !  The 
Alumni  of  Harvard  University  could  never,  till  this  season, 
keep  their  holidays  without  strong  drink.*  If  rich  men 
continue  to  drink  without  need,  the  poor  will  long  continue 
to  be  drunk.  Vices,  like  decayed  furniture,  go  down.  They 
keep  their  shape,  but  become  more  frightful.  In  this  way 
the  refined  man  who  often  drinks,  but  is  never  drunk,  cor- 
rupts hundreds  of  men  whom  he  never  saw,  and  without 
"intending  it  becomes  a  foe  to  society. 

Then,  too,  some  of  our  influential  temperance  men  aid  us 
no  longer.  Beecher  is  not  here  ;  Channing  and  Ware  have 
gone  to  their  reward.  That  other  man,t  benevolent  and 

*  For  this  much  needed  reform  at  the  academical  table,  we  are 
indebted  to  the  Hon.  Edward  Everett,  the  President  of  Harvard 
College.  For  this  he  deserves  the  hearty  thanks  of  the  whole  com- 
munity. 

f  Rev.  John  Pierpont. 


•  PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  151 

indefatigable,  where  is  he  ?  He  trod  the  worm  of  the  still 
under  his  feet,  but  the  worm  of  the  pulpit  stung  him,  and 
he  too  is  gone  ;  that  champion  of  temperance,  that  old  man 
eloquent,  driven  out  of  Boston.  Why  should  I  not  tell  an 
open  secret  ?  —  driven  out  by  rum  and  the  Unitarian  clergy 
of  Boston. 

Whatsoever  the  causes  may  be,  I  think  you  see  proofs 
enough  of  the  fact,  that  drunkenness  has  increased  within 
the  last  few  years.  You  see  it  in  the  men  drunken  in  the 
streets,  in  the  numerous  shops  built  to  gratify  the  intemper- 
ate man.  Some  of  these  are  elegant  and  costly,  only  for 
the  rich  ;  others  so  mean  and  dirty,  that  one  must  be  low 
indeed  to  wallow  therein.  But  the  same  thing  is  there  in 
both,  rum,  poison-drink.  Many  of  these  latter  are  kept  by 
poor  men,  and  the  spider's  web  of  the  law  now  and  then 
catches  one  of  them,  though  latterly  but  seldom  here.  Some- 
times they  are  kept,  and,  perhaps,  generally  owned  by  rich 
men  who  drive  through  the  net.  I  know  how  hard  it  is  to 
see  through  a  dollar,  though  misery  stand  behind  it,  if  the 
dollar  be  your  own,  and  the  misery  belong  to  your  brother. 
I  feel  pity  for  the  man  who  helps  ruin  his  race,  who  scat- 
ters firebrands  and  death  throughout  society,  scathing  the 
heads  of  rich  and  poor,  and  old  and  young.  I  would  speak 
charitably  of  such  an  one  as  of  a  fellow-sinner.  How  he 
can  excuse  it  to  his  own  conscience  is  his  affair,  not  mine. 
I  speak  only  of  the  fact.  For  a  poor  man  there  may  be 
some  excuse  ;  he  has  no  other  calling  whereby  to  gain  his 
bread  ;  he  would  not  see  his  own  children  beg,  nor  starve, 
nor  steal !  To  see  his  neighbor  go  to  ruin  and  drag  thither 
his  children  and  wife,  was  not  so  hard.  But  it  is  not  the 
shops  of  the  poor  men  that  do  most  harm  !  Had  there 
been  none  but  these,  they  had  long  ago  been  shut,  and 
intemperance  done  with.  It  is  not  poor  men  that  manufac- 
ture this  poison;  nor  they  who  import  it,  or  sell  by  the 
wholesale.  If  there  were  no  rich  men  in  this  trade  there 
would  soon  be  no  poor  ones !  But  how  does  the  rich  man 
reconcile  it  to  his  conscience  ?  1  cannot  answer  that. 


152  SERMON    OF    THE 

It  is  difficult  to  find  out  the  number  of  drink-shops  in  the 
city.  The  assessors  say  there  are  eight  hundred  and  fifty  ; 
another  authority  makes  the  number  twelve  hundred.  Let 
us  suppose  there  are  but  one  thousand.  I  think  that  much 
below  the  real  number,  for  the  assistant  assessors  found 
three  hundred  in  a  single  ward  !  These  shops  are  open 
morning  and  night.  More  is  sold  on  Sunday,  it  is  said, 
than  any  other  day  in  the  week !  While  you  are  here  to 
worship  your  Father,  some  of  your  brothers  are  making 
themselves  as  beasts  ;  yes,  lower.  You  shall  probably  see 
them  at  the  doors  of  these  shops  as  you  go  home ;  drunk 
in  the  streets  this  day  !  To  my  mind,  the  retailers  are 
committing  a  great  offence.  I  am  no  man's  judge,  and 
cannot  condemn  even  them.  There  is  one  that  judgeth. 
I  cannot  stand  in  the  place  of  any  man's  conscience.  I 
know  well  enough  what  is  sin  ;  God,  only,  who  is  a  sinner. 
Yet  I  cannot  think  the  poor  man  that  retails,  half  so  bad  as 
the  rich  man  who  distils,  imports,  or  sells  by  wholesale  the 
infamous  drug.  He  knew  better,  and  cannot  plead  poverty 
as  the  excuse  of  his  crime. 

Let  me  mention  some  of  the  statistics  of  this  trade  before 
I  speak  of  its  effects.  If  there  are  one  thousand  drink- 
shops,  and  each  sells  liquor  to  the  amount  of  only  six  dollars 
a  day,  which  is  the  price  of  only  one  hundred  drams,  or 
two  hundred  at  the  lowest  shops,  then  we  have  the  sum  of 
$2,190,000  paid  for  liquor  to  be  drunk  on  the  spot  every 
year.  This  sum  is  considerably  more  than  double  the 
amount  paid  for  the  whole  public  education  of  the  people 
in  the  entire  State  of  Massachusetts  !  In  Boston  alone,  last 
year,  there  were  distilled  2,873,623  gallons  of  spirit.  In 
five  years,  from  1840  to  1845,  Boston  exported  2,156,990, 
and  imported  ^,887,993  gallons.  They  burnt  up  a  man  the 
other  day,  at  the  distillery  in  Merrimac  street.  You  read 
the  story  in  the  daily  papers,  and  remember  how  the  by- 
standers looked  on  with  horror  to  see  the  wounded  man 
attempting  with  his  hands  to  fend  off  the  flames  from  his 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  153 

naked  head  !  Great  Heaven !  It  was  not  the  first  man 
that  distillery  has  burned  up  !  No,  not  by  thousands.  You 
see  men  about  your  streets,  all  afire  ;  some  half-burnt  down; 
some  with  all  the  soul  burned  out,  only  the  cinders  left  of 
the  man,  the  shell  and  wall,  and  that  tumbling  and  tottering, 
ready  to  fall.  Who  of  you  has  not  lost  a  relative,  at  least  a 
friend,  in  that  withering  flame,  that  terrible  Auto  da  fe,  that 
hell-fire  on  earth  ? 

Let  us  look  away  from  that.  I  wish  we  could  look  on 
something  to  efface  that  ghastly  sight.  But  see  the  results 
of  this  trade.  Do  you  wonder  at  the  poverty  just  now 
spoken  of;  at  the  vagrant  children  ?  In  the  Poor  House  at 
Albany,  at  one  time,  there  were  633  persons,  and  of  them 
615  were  intemperate  !  Ask  your  city  authorities  how 
many  of  the  poor  are  brought  to  their  Almshouse  directly 
or  remotely  by  intemperance  !  Do  you  wonder  at  the  crime 
which  fills  your  jails,  and  swells  the  tax  of  county  and  city? 
Three  fourths  of  the  petty  crime  in  the  State  comes  from 
this  source  directly  or  remotely.  Your  jails  were  never  so 
full  before  !  When  the  parents  are  there,  what  is  left  for 
the  children  ?  In  Prussia,  the  Government  which  imprisons 
the  father  takes  care  of  the  children,  and  sends  them  to 
school.  Here  they  are  forced  into  crime. 

As  I  gave  some  statistics  of  the  cause,  let  me  also  give 
some  of  the  effect.  Two  years  ago  your  Grand  Jury  re- 
ports that  one  of  the  city  police,  on  Sunday  morning,  be- 
tween the  hours  of  twelve  and  two,  in  walking  from  Cornhill 
square  to  Cambridge  street,  passed  more  than  one  hundred 
persons  more  or  less  drunk  !  In  1844  there  were  committed 
to  your  House  of  Correction,  for  drunkenness,  453  persons  ; 
in  1845,  595;  in  1846,  up  to  the  24th  of  August,  that  is,  in 
seven  months  and  twenty-four  days,  446.  Besides  there 
have  been  already  in  this  year  396  complained  of  at  the 
Police  Court  and  fined,  but  not  sent  to  the  House  of  Correc- 
tion. Thus,  in  seven  months  and  twenty-four  days,  842 
persons  have  been  legally  punished  for  public  drunkenness. 


154  SERMON    OF    THE 

In  the  last  two  months  and  a  half  445  persons  were  thus 
punished.  In  the  first  twenty-four  days  of  this  month,  94  ! 
In  the  last  year  there  were  4643  persons  committed  to  your 
watch-houses,  more  than  the  twenty-fifth  of  the  whole  pop- 
ulation. The  thousand  drink-shops  levy  a  direct  tax  of  more 
than  $'2,000,000.  That  is  only  the  first  outlay.  The  whole 
ultimate  cost  in  idleness,  sickness,  crime,  death  and  broken 
hearts  —  I  leave  you  to  calculate  that!  The  men  who  live 
in  the  lower  courts,  familiar  with  the  sinks  of  iniquity,  speak 
of  this  crime  as  "  most  awful !"  Yet  in  this  month  and 
the  last,  there  were  but  nine  persons  indicted  for  the  illegal 
sale  of  the  poison  which  so  wastes  the  people's  life  !  The 
head  of  your  Police  and  the  foreman  of  your  last  Grand 
Jury  are  prominent  in  that  trade. 

Does  the  Government  know  of  these  things  ;  know  of  their 
cause  ?  One  would  hope  not.  The  last  Grand  Jury  in  their 
public  report,  after  speaking  manfully  of  some  actual  evils, 
instead  of  pointing  at  drunkenness  and  bar-rooms,  direct 
your  attention  "  to  the  increased  number  of  omnibuses  and 
other  large  carriages  in  the  streets." 

These  are  sad  things  to  think  of  in  a  Christian  church. 
What  shall  we  do  for  all  these  little  ones  that  are  perishing  ? 
"Do  nothing,"  say  some.  "Am  I  my  brother's  keeper?  " 
asked  the  first  Cain,  after  killing  that  brother.  He  thought 
the  answer  would  be,  "  No  !  you  are  not."  But  he  was  his 
brother's  keeper,  and  Abel's  blood  cried  from  the  ground  for 
justice,  and  God  heard  it.  Some  say  we  can  do  nothing. 
I  will  never  believe  that  a  city  which  in  twelve  years  can 
build  near  a  thousand  miles  of  railroad,  hedge  up  the  Merri- 
mack  and  the  lakes  of  New  Hampshire  ;  I  will  never  believe 
that  a  city,  so  full  of  the  hardiest  enterprise  and  the  noblest 
charity,  cannot  keep  these  little  ones  from  perishing.  Why 
the  nation  can  annex  new  States  and  raise  armies  at  un- 
counted cost.  Can  it  not  extirpate  pauperism,  prevent 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  155 

intemperance,  pluck  up  the  causes  of  the  present  crime  ? 
All  that  is  lacking  is  the  prudent  will ! 

It  seems  as  if  something  could  easily  be  done  to  send  the 
vagrant  children  to  school ;  at  least  to  give  them  employ- 
ment, and  so  teach  them  some  useful  art.  If  some  are 
Catholics,  and  will  not  attend  the  Protestant  schools,  per- 
haps it  would  be  as  possible  to  have  a  special  and  separate 
school  for  the  Irish  as  for  the  Africans.  It  was  recently 
proposed  in  a  Protestant  assembly  to  found  Sunday  Schools, 
with  Catholic  teachers  for  Catholic  children.  The  plan  is 
large  and  noble,  and  indicates  a  liberality  which  astonishes 
one  even  here,  where  some  men  are  ceasing  to  be  sectarian 
and  becoming  human.  Much  may  be  done  to  bring  many 
of  the  children  to  our  Sunday  and  week-day  schools,  as  they 
now  are,  and  so  brands  be  snatched  from  the  burning.  The 
State  Farm  School  for  juvenile  offenders,  which  a  good  man 
last  winter  suggested  to  your  Legislature,  will  doubtless  do 
much  for  these  idle  boys,  and  may  be  the  beginning  of  a 
greater  and  better  work.  Could  the  State  also  take  care  of 
the  children  when  it  locks  the  parents  in  a  jail,  there  would 
be  a  nearer  approach  to  justice  and  greater  likelihood  of  ob- 
taining its  end.  Still  the  laws  act  cumbrously  and  slow. 
The  great  work  must  be  done  by  good  men,  acting  sepa- 
rately or  in  concert,  in  their  private  way.  You  are  your 
brother's  keeper ;  God  made  you  so.  If  you  are  rich,  in- 
telligent, refined  and  religious,  why  you  are  all  the  more  a 
keeper  to  the  poor,  the  weak,  the  vulgar  and  the  wicked. 
In  the  pauses  of  your  work  there  will  be  time  to  do  some- 
thing. In  the  unoccupied  hours  of  the  Sunday  there  is  yet 
leisure  to  help  a  brother's  need.  If  there  are  times  when 
you  are  disposed  to  murmur  at  your  own  hard  lot,  though  it 
is  not  hard  ;  or  hours  when  grief  presses  heavy  on  your 
heart,  go  and  look  after  these  children,  find  them  employ- 
ment, and  help  them  to  start  in  life  ;  you  will  find  your  mur- 
murings  are  ended,  and  your  sorrow  forgot. 

It  does  not  seem  difficult  to  do  something  for  the  poor.     It 


156  SERMON    OK    THE 

would  be  easy  to  provide  comfortable  and  convenient  houses 
and  at  a  reasonable  rate.  The  experiment  has  been  tried  by 
one  noble-hearted  man,  and  thus  far  works  well.  I  trust  the 
same  plan,  or  one  better,  if  possible,  will  soon  be  tried  on  a 
larger  scale,  and  so  repeated,  till  we  are  free  from  that 
crowding  together  of  miserable  persons,  which  now  disgraces 
our  city.  It  seems  to  me  that  a  store  might  be  established 
where  articles  of  good  quality  should  be  furnished  to  the 
poor  at  cost.  Something  has  already  been  done  in  this  way, 
by  the  "  Trade's  Union,"  who  need  it  much  less.  A  prac- 
tical man  could  easily  manage  the  details  of  such  a  scheme. 
All  reform  and  elevation  of  this  class  of  men  must  begin  by 
mending  their  circumstances,  though  of  course  it  must  not 
end  there.  Expect  no  improvement  of  men  that  are  hungry, 
naked,  and  cold.  Few  men  respect  themselves  in  that  con- 
dition. Hope  not  of  others  what  would  be  impossible  for 
you  ! 

You  may  give  better  pay  when  that  is  possible.  I  can 
hardly  think  it  the  boast  of  a  man,  that  he  has  paid  less  for 
his  labor  than  any  other  in  his  calling.  But  it  is  a  common 
boast,  though  to  me  it  seems  the  glory  of  a  pirate  !  I  can- 
not believe  there  is  that  sharp  distinction  between  week-day 
religion  and  Sunday  religion,  or  between  justice  and  charity, 
that  is  sometimes  pretended.  A  man  both  just  and  charita- 
ble would  find  his  charity  run  over  into  his  justice,  and  the 
mixture  improve  its  quality.  When  I  remember  that  all 
value  is  the  result  of  work,  and  see  likewise  that  no  man 
gets  rich  by  his  own  work,  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  labor 
is  often  wickedly  underpaid,  and  capital  sometimes  as  grossly 
over-fed.  I  shall  believe  that  capital  is  at  the  mercy  of 
labor,  when  the  two  extremes  of  society  change  places.  Is 
it  Christian  or  manly  to  reduce  wages  in  hard  times,  and  not 
raise  them  in  fair  times  ?  and  not  raise  them  again  in  extra- 
ordinary times  ?  Is  it  God's  will  that  large  dividends  and 
small  wages  should  be  paid  at  the  same  time  ?  The  duty  of 
the  employer  is  not  over,  when  he  has  paid  "the  hands" 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  157 

their  wages.  Abraham  is  a  special  providence  for  Eliezer, 
as  God,  the  universal  providence,  for  both.  The  usages  of 
society  make  a  sharp  distinction  between  the  rich  and  poor ; 
but  I  cannot  believe  the  churches  have  done  wisely,  by 
making  that  distinction  appear  through  separating  the  two, 
in  their  worship.  The  poor  are,  undesignedly,  driven  out 
of  the  respectable  churches.  They  lose  self-respect ;  lose 
religion.  Those  that  remain,  what  have  they  gained  by  this 
expulsion  of  their  brothers  ?  A  beautiful  and  costly  house, 
but  a  church  without  the  poor.  The  Catholics  were  wiser 
and  more  humane  than  that.  I  cannot  believe  the  mightiest 
abilities  and  most  exquisite  culture  were  ever  too  great  to 
preach  and  apply  Christianity  among  the  poor ;  and  that 
"  the  best  sermons  would  be  wasted  on  them."  Yet  such 
has  not  been  the  practical  decision  here  !  I  trust  we  shall 
yet  be  able  to  say  of  all  our  churches,  however  costly, 
"  There  the  rich  and  poor  meet  together."  They  are  now 
equally  losers  by  the  separation.  The  seventy  ministers  of 
Boston  —  how  much  they  can  do  for  this  class  of  little  ones, 
if  they  will ! 

It  has  been  suggested*  by  some  kindly  and  wise  men,  that 
there  should  be  a  Prisoners'  Home  established,  where  the 
criminal,  on  being  released  from  jail,  could  go  and  find  a 
home  and  work.  As  the  case  now  is,  there  is  almost  no 
hope  for  the  poor  offender.  "  Legal  justice  "  proves  often 
legal  vengeance,  and  total  ruin  to  the  poor  wretch  on  whom 
it  falls ;  it  grinds  him  to  powder !  All  reform  of  criminals, 
without  such  a  place,  seems  to  me  worse  than  hopeless.  If 
possible,  such  an  institution  seems  more  needed  for  the 
women,  than  even  for  the  men :  but  I  have  not  now  time  to 
dwell  on  this  theme.  You  know  the  efforts  of  two  good 
men  amongst  us,  who,  with  slender  means,  and  no  great  en- 
couragement from  the  public,  are  indeed  the  friends  of  the 
prisoner.*  God  bless  them  in  their  labors. 

*  The  editors  of  the  "  Prisoners'  Friend." 
14 


158  SERMON    OF    THE 

We  can  do  something  in  all  these  schemes  for  helping 
the  poor.  Each  of  us  can  do  something  in  his  own  sphere, 
and  now  and  then  step  out  of  that  sphere  to  do  something 
more.  1  know  there  are  many  amongst  you,  who  only  re- 
quire a  word  before  they  engage  in  this  work,  and  some 
who  do  not  require  even  that,  but  are  more  competent  than 
I  to  speak  that  word.  Your  Committee  of  Benevolent 
Action  have  not  been  idle.  Their  works  speak  for  them. 

For  the  suppression  of  intemperance,  redoubled  efforts 
must  be  made.  Men  of  wealth,  education  and  influence 
must  use  their  strength  of  nature,  or  position,  to  protect 
their  brothers,  not  drive  them  down  to  ruin.  Temperance 
cannot  advance  much  further  among  the  people,  until  this 
class  of  men  lend  their  aid  ;  at  least,  until  they  withdraw 
the  obstacles  they  have  hitherto  and  so  often  opposed  to  its 
progress.  They  must  forbear  the  use,  as  well  as  the  traffic. 
I  cannot  but  think  the  time  is  coming,  when  he  who  makes  or 
sells  this  poison  as  a  drink,  will  be  legally  ranked  with  other 
poisoners,  with  thieves,  robbers,  and  house-burners ;  when 
a  fortune  acquired  by  such  means  will  be  thought  infamous, 
as  one  now  would  be  if  acquired  by  piracy !  I  know  good 
men  have  formerly  engaged  in  this  trade  ;  they  did  it  igno- 
rantly.  Now,  we  know  the  unavoidable  effects  thereof.  I 
trust  the  excellent  example  lately  set  by  the  Government 
of  the  University,  will  soon  be  followed  at  all  public 
festivals. 

We  must  still  have  a  watchful  eye  on  the  sale  of  this 
poison.  It  is  not  the  low  shops  which  do  the  most  harm,  but 
the  costly  tippling-houses  which  keep  the  low  ones  in  coun- 
tenance, and  thus  shield  them  from  the  law  and  public 
feeling.  It  seems  as  if  a  law  were  needed,  making  the 
owner  of  a  tippling-house  responsible  for  the  illegal  sale  of 
liquors  there.  Then  the  real  offender  might  be  reached, 
who  now  escapes  the  meshes  of  the  law. 

It  has  long  ago  been  suggested  that  a  Temperance  Home 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  159 

was  needed  for  the  reformation  of  the  unfortunate  drunkard. 
It  is  plain  that  the  jail  does  not  reform  him.  Those  sent 
to  jail  for  drunkenness  are,  on  the  average,  sentenced  no  less 
than  five  times  ;  some  of  them,  fifteen  or  twenty  times !  Of 
what  use  to  shut  a  man  in  a  jail,  and  release  him  with  the 
certainty  that  he  will  come  out  no  better,  and  soon  return 
for  the  same  offence  ?  When  as  much  zeal  and  ability  are 
directed  to  cure  this  terrible  public  malady,  as  now  go  to 
increase  it,  we  shall  not  thus  foolishly  waste  our  strength. 
You  all  know  how  much  has  been  done  by  one  man  in  this 
matter;*  that  in  four  years  he  saved  three  hundred  drunkards 
from  the  prison,  two  hundred  of  whom  have  since  done 
well !  If  it  be  the  duty  of  the  State  to  prevent  crime,  not 
avenge  it,  is  it  not  plain  what  is  the  way  ? 

However,  a  reform  in  this  matter  will  be  permanent  only 
through  a  deeper  and  wider  reform  elsewhere.  Drunkenness 
and  theft  in  its  various  illegal  forms,  are  confined  almost 
wholly  to  the  poorest  class.  So  long  as  there  is  unavoidable 
misery,  like  the  present,  pauperism  and  popular  ignorance ; 
so  long  as  thirty-seven  are  crowded  into  one  house,  and  that 
not  large  ;  so  long  as  men  are  wretched  and  without  hope, 
there  will  be  drunkenness.  I  know  much  has  been  done 
already ;  I  think  drunkenness  will  never  be  respectable 
again,  or  common  amongst  refined  and  cultivated  men ;  it 
will  be  common  among  the  ignorant,  the  outcast  and  the 
miserable,  so  long  as  the  present  causes  of  poverty,  igno- 
rance and  misery  continue.  For  that  continuance,  and  the 
want,  the  crime,  the  unimaginable  wretchedness  and  death 
of  heart  which  comes  thereof,  it  is  not  these  perishing  little 
ones,  but  the  strong  that  are  responsible  before  God  !  It  will 
not  do  for  your  grand  juries  to  try  and  hide  the  matter 
by  indicting  "  omnibuses  and  other  large  carriages ; "  the 
voice  of  God  cries,  Where  is  thy  brother  ?  —  and  that 
brother's  blood  answers  from  the  ground. 

*  Mr.  Johu  Augustus. 


160  SERMON    OF    THE 

What  I  have  suggested  only  palliates  effects ;  it  removes 
no  cause;  —  of  that  another  time.  These  little  ones  are 
perishing  here  in  the  midst  of  us.  Society  has  never 
seriously  sought  to  prevent  it,  perhaps  has  not  been  conscious 
of  the  fact.  It  has  not  so  much  legislated  for  them  as  against 
them.  Its  spirit  is  hostile  to  them.  If  the  mass  of  able- 
headed  men  were  in  earnest  about  this,  think  you  they 
would  allow  such  unthrifty  ways,  such  a  waste  of  man's 
productive  energies  ?  Never !  no,  never.  They  would  repel 
the  causes  of  this  evil  as  now  an  invading  army.  The  re- 
moval of  these  troubles  must  be  brought  about  by  a  great 
change  in  the  spirit  of  society.  Society  is  not  Christian  in 
form  or  spirit.  So  there  are  many  who  do  not  love  to  hear 
Christianity  preached  and  applied,  but  to  have  some  halting 
theology  set  upon  its  crutches.  They  like,  on  Sundays,  to 
hear  of  the  sacrifice,  not  to  have  mercy  and  goodness 
demanded  of  them.  A  Christian  State  after  the  pattern  of 
that  divine  man,  Jesus  —  how  different  it  would  be  from  this 
in  spirit  and  in  form  ! 

Taking  all  this  whole  State  into  account,  things,  on  the 
whole,  are  better  here,  than  in  any  similar  population,  after 
all  these  evils.  I  think  there  can  be  no  doubt  of  that ;  better 
now,  on  the  whole,  than  ever  before.  A  day's  work  will 
produce  a  greater  quantity  of  needful  things  than  hitherto. 
So  the  number  of  little  ones  that  perish  is  smaller  than  here- 
tofore, in  proportion  to  the  whole  mass.  I  do  not  believe  the 
world  can  show  such  examples  of  public  charity  as  this  city 
has  afforded  in  the  last  fifty  years.  Alas !  we  want  the 
justice  which  prevents  causes  no  less  than  the  charity  which 
palliates  effects.  See  yet  the  unnatural  disparity  in  man's 
condition :  bloated  opulence  and  starving  penury  in  the 
same  street!  See  the  pauperism,  want,  licentiousness,  in- 
temperance and  crime  in  the  midst  of  us  ;  see  the  havoc 
made  of  woman  ;  see  the  poor  deserted  by  their  elder 
brother,  while  it  is  their  sweat  which  enriches  your  ground, 
builds  your  railroads,  and  piles  up  your  costly  houses.  The 


PERISHING    CLASSES    IN    BOSTON.  161 

tall  gallows  stands  in  the  back-ground  of  society,  over- 
looking it  all ;  where  it  should  be  the  blessed  gospel  of  the 
living  God. 

What  we  want  to  remove  the  cause  of  all  this  is  the 
application  of  Christianity  to  social  life.  Nothing  less  will 
do  the  work.  Each  of  us  can  help  forward  that  by  doing 
the  part  which  falls  in  his  way.  Christianity,  like  the 
eagle's  flight,  begins  at  home.  We  can  go  further,  and  do 
something  for  each  of  these  classes  of  little  ones.  Then  we 
shall  help  others  do  the  same.  Some  we  may  encourage  to 
practical  Christianity  by  our  example  ;  some  we  may  per- 
haps shame.  Still  more,  we  can  ourselves  be  pure,  manly, 
Christian  ;  each  of  us  that,  in  heart  and  life.  We  can 
build  up  a  company  of  such,  men  of  perpetual  growth. 
Then  we  shall  be  ready  not  only  for  this  special  work  now 
before  us,  to  palliate  effects,  but  for  every  Christian  and 
manly  duty  when  it  comes.  Then,  if  ever  some  scheme  is 
offered  which  is  nobler  and  yet  more  Christian  than  what 
we  now  behold,  it  will  find  us  booted,  and  girded,  and  road- 
ready. 

I  look  to  you  to  do  something  in  this  matter.  You  are 
many  ;  most  of  you  are  young  I  look  to  you  to  set  an 
example  of  a  noble  life,  human,  clean  and  Christian,  not 
debasing  these  little  ones,  but  lifting  them  up.  Will  you 
cause  them  to  perish ;  you  ?  I  know  you  will  not.  Will 
you  let  them  perish?  I  cannot  believe  it.  Will  you  not 
prevent  their  perishing  ?  Nothing  less  is  your  duty. 

Some  men  say  they  will  do  nothing  to  help  liberate  the 
slave,  because  he  is  afar-ofT,  and  "  our  mission  is  silence  ! " 
Well  —  here  are  sufferers  in  a  nearer  need.  Do  you  say,  I 
can  do  but  little  to  Christianize  society !  Very  well,  do  that 
little,  and  see  if  it  does  not  amount  to  much,  and  bring  its 
own  blessing  —  the  thought  that  you  have  given  a  cup  of 
cold  water  to  one  of  the  little  ones.  Did  not  Jesus  say, 
"  Inasmuch  as  ye  have  done  it  unto  one  of  the  least  of  these 
ye  have  done  it  unto  me  ?  " 
14* 


162  SERMON    OF    THE    PERISHING    CLASSES. 

Since  last  we  met,  one  of  our  number*  has  taken  that  step 
in  life  commonly  called  death.  He  was  deeply  interested 
and  active  in  the  movement  for  the  perishing  classes  of  men. 
After  his  spirit  had  passed  on,  a  woman  whom  he  had 
rescued,  and  her  children  with  her,  from  intemperance  and 
ruin,  came  and  laid  her  hand  on  that  cold  forehead  whence 
the  kindly  soul  had  fled,  and  mourning  that  her  failures  had 
often  grieved  his  heart  before,  vowed  solemnly  to  keep 
steadfast  for  ever,  and  go  back  to  evil  ways  no  more  !  Who 
would  not  wish  his  forehead  the  altar  for  such  a  vow  ?  what 
nobler  monument  to  a  good  man's  memory  !  The  blessing 
of  those  ready  to  perish  fell  on  him.  If  his  hand  cannot 
help  us,  his  example  may. 

*  Nathaniel  F.  Thayer,  aged  29. 


VII. 

A   SERMON   OP   MERCHANTS.      PREACHED    AT    THE  MKLODEON  ON 
SINDAY,  NOVKMREK  22,   1846. 


ECCLESIASTICUS    XXVII.   2. 

AS    A     NAIL   STICKKTH    FAST    BETWEEN     TUB    JOIN'IXGS    OF    THE  STONES;     fO    DOTH    SIN 
STICK  CLOSE   BETWEEN    Bl'YIM!    AND   SULLIMi. 

.  I  ASK  your  attention  to  a  Sermon  of  Merchants,  their 
Position,  Temptations,  Opportunities,  Influence  and  Duty. 
For  the  present  purpose,  men  may  be  distributed  into  four 
classes. 

I.  Men  who  create  new  material  for  human  use,  either 
by  digging  it  out  of  mines  and  quarries,  fishing  it  out  of  the 
sea,  or  raising  it  out  of  the  land.     These  are  direct  pro- 
ducers. 

II.  Men  who  apply  their  head  and  hands  to  this  material 
and  transform  it  into  other  shapes,  fitting  it  for  human  use  ; 
men  that  make  grain  into  fleur  and  bread,  cotton  into  cloth, 
iron  into  needles  or  knives,  and  the  like.     These  are  indi- 
rect producers ;  they  create  not  the  material,  but  its  fitness, 
use,  or  beauty.     They  are  manufacturers. 

III.  Men  who  simply  use  these  things,  when  thus   pro- 
duced and  manufactured.     They  are  consumers. 

IV.  Men  who  buy  and  sell  :   who  buy  to  sell,  and  sell  to 
buy  the   more.     They  fetch   and  carry  between   the  other 
classes.     These  are   distributors  ;  they  are  the  Merchants. 


164  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

Under  this  name  I  include  the  whole  class  who  live  by  buy- 
ing and  selling,  and  not  merely  those  conventionally  called 
merchants,  to  distinguish  them  from  small  dealers.  This 
term  comprises  traders  behind  counters  and  traders  behind 
desks  ;  traders  neither  behind  counters  nor  desks. 

There  are  various  grades  of  merchants.  They  might  be 
classed  and  symbolized  according  as  they  use  a  basket,  a 
wheelbarrow,  a  cart,  a  stall,  a  booth,  a  shop,  a  warehouse, 
counting-room,  or  bank.  Still  all  are  the  same  thing  —  men 
who  live  by  buying  and  selling.  A  ship  is  only  a  large 
basket,  a  warehouse  a  costly  stall.  Your  pedler  is  a  small 
merchant  going  round  from  house  to  house  with  his  basket, 
to  mediate  between  persons  ;  your  merchant  only  a  great 
pedler  sending  round  from  land  to  land  with  his  ships  to 
mediate  between  nations.  The  Israelitish  woman  who  sits 
behind  a  bench  in  her  stall  on  the  Rialto  at  Venice,  changing 
gold  into  silver  and  copper,  or  loaning  money  to  him  who 
leaves  hat,  coat,  and  other  collaterals  in  pledge,  is  a  small 
banker.  The  Israelitish  man  who  sits  at  Frankfort  on  the 
Maine,  changes  drafts  into  specie,  and  lends  millions  to  men 
who  leave  in  pledge  a  mortgage  on  the  States  of  the  Church, 
Austria  or  Russia  —  is  a  pawnbroker  and  money  changer 
on  a  large  scale.  By  this  arithmetic,  for  present  conve- 
nience, all  grades  of  merchants  are  reduced  to  one  denomi- 
nation —  men  who  live  by  buying  and  selling. 

All  these  four  classes  run  into  one  another.  The  same 
man  may  belong  to  all  at  the  same  time.  All  are  needed. 
At  home  a  merchant  is  a  mediator  to  go  between  the  pro- 
ducer and  the  manufacturer ;  between  both  and  the  consum- 
er. On  a  large  scale  he  is  the  mediator  who  goes  between 
continents,  between  producing  and  manufacturing  States, 
between  both  and  consuming  countries.  The  calling  is 
founded  in  the  state  of  society,  as  that  in  a  compromise  be- 
tween man's  permanent  nature  and  transient  condition.  So 
long  as  there  are  producers  and  consumers,  there  must  be 
distributors.  The  value  of  the  calling  depends  on  its  im- 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  165 

portance ;  its  usefulness  is  the  measure  of  its  respectability. 
The  most  useful  calling  must  be  the  noblest.  If  it  is  diffi- 
cult, demanding  great  ability  and  self-sacrifice,  it  is  yet 
more  noble.  A  useless  calling  is  disgraceful  ;  one  that  in- 
jures mankind  —  infamous.  Tried  by  this  standard,  the 
producers  seem  nobler  than  the  distributors ;  they  than  the 
mere  consumers.  This  may  not  be  the  popular  judgment 
now,  but  must  one  day  become  so,  for  mankind  is  slowly 
learning  to  judge  by  the  natural  law  published  by  Jesus  — 
that  he  who  would  be  greatest  of  all,  must  be  most  effectively 
the  servant  of  all. 

There  are  some  who  do  not  seem  to  belong  to  any  of  the 
active  classes,  who  are  yet  producers,  manufacturers  and  dis-» 
tributors  by  their  head,  more  than  their  hand  ;  men  who  have 
fertile  heads,  producers,  manufacturers,  and  distributors  of 
thought,  active  in  the  most  creative  way.  Here,  however, 
the  common  rule  is  inverted  :  the  producers  are  few  —  men 
of  genius  ;  the  manufacturers  many — men  of  talent ;  the  dis- 
tributors —  men  of  tact,  men  who  remember,  and  talk  with 
tongue  or  pen,  their  name  is  legion.  I  will  not  stop  to  dis- 
tribute them  into  their  classes,  but  return  to  the  merchant. 

The  calling  of  the  merchant  acquires  a  new  importance 
in  modern  times.  Once  nations  were  cooped  up,  each  in 
its  own  country  and  language.  Then  war  was  the  only  me- 
diator between  them.  They  met  but  on  the  battle-field,  or 
in  solemn  embassies  to  treat  for  peace.  Now  trade  is  the 
mediator.  They  meet  on  the  exchange.  To  the  merchant,' 
no  man  who  can  trade  is  a  foreigner.  His  wares  prove  him 
a  citizen.  Gold  and  silver  are  cosmopolitan.  Once,  in 
some  of  the  old  governments,  the  magistrates  swore,  "  I  will 
be  evil-minded  towards  the  people,  and  will  devise  against 
them  the  worst  thing  I  can."  Now  they  swear  to  keep  the 
laws  which  the  people  have  made.  Once  the  great  question 
was,  How  large  is  the  standing  army  ?  Now,  What  is  the 
amount  of  the  national  earnings  ?  Statesmen  ask  less  about 
the  ships  of  the  line,  than  about  the  ships  of  trade.  They 


166  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

fear  an  over-importation  oftener  than  a  war,  and  settle  their 
difficulties  in  gold  and  silver,  not  as  before  with  iron.  All 
ancient  states  were  military  ;  the  modern  mercantile.  War 
is  getting  out  of  favor  as  property  increases  and  men  get 
their  eyes  open.  Once  every  man  feared  death,  captivity, 
or  at  least  robbery  in  war  :  now  the  worst  fear  is  of  bank- 
ruptcy and  pauperism. 

This  is  a  wonderful  change.  Look  at  some  of  the  signs 
thereof.  Once  castles  and  forts  were  the  finest  buildings ; 
now  exchanges,  shops,  custom-houses  and  banks.  Once 
men  built  a  Chinese  wall  to  keep  out  the  strangers — for 
stranger  and  foe  were  the  same ;  now  men  build  railroads 
and  steam-ships  to  bring  them  in.  England  was  once  a 
strong-hold  of  robbers,  her  four  seas  but  so  many  castle- 
moats  ;  now  she  is  a  great  harbor  with  four  ship-chan- 
nels. Once  her  chief  must  be  a  bold,  cunning  fighter; 
now  a  good  steward  and  financier.  Not  to  strike  a  hard 
blow,  but  to  make  a  good  bargain  is  the  thing.  Formerly 
the  most  enterprising  and  hopeful  young  men  sought  fame 
and  fortune  in  deeds  of  arms ;  now  an  army  is  only  a 
common  sewer,  and  most  of  those  who  go  to  the  war,  if 
they  never  return,  "  have  left  their  country  for  their  coun- 
try's good."  In  days  gone  by,  constructive  art  could  build 
nothing  better  than  hanging  gardens,  and  the  pyramids  — 
foolishly  sublime ;  now  it  makes  docks,  canals,  iron  roads 
and  magnetic  telegraphs.  Saint  Louis,  in  his  old  age,  got  up 
a  crusade,  and  saw  his  soldiers  die  of  the  fever  at  Tunis  ; 
now  the  King  of  the  French  sets  up  a  factory,  and  will 
clothe  his  people  in  his  own  cottons  and  woollens.  The  old 
Douglas  and  Percy  were  clad  in  iron,  and  harried  the  land 
on  both  sides  of  the  Tweed  ;  their  descendants  now  are 
civil-suited  men  who  keep  the  peace.  No  girl  trembles, 
though  "  All  the  blue  bonnets  are  over  the  border."  The 
warrior  has  become  a  shopkeeper. 

"  Lord  Stafford  mines  for  coal  and  salt ; 
The  Duke  of  Norfolk  deals  in  malt, 
The  Douglas  in  red  herrings  ; 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  1G7 

And  noble  name  and  cultured  land, 
Palace  and  park  and  vassal  band, 
Are  powerless  to  the  notes  of  hand 
Of  Rothschild  or  the  Barings." 

Of  merchants  there  are  three  classes. 

I.  Merchant-producers,  who  deal  in  labor  applied  to  the 
direct  creation  of  new  material.     They  buy  labor  and  land, 
to  sell  them  in  corn,  cotton,  coal,  timber,  salt,  and  iron. 

II.  Merchant-manufacturers,  who  deal  in  labor  applied  to 
transforming  that  material.     They  buy  labor,  wool,  cotton, 
silk,  water-privileges  and  steam-power,  to  sell  them  all  in 
finished  cloth. 

III.  Merchant-traders,   who   simply  distribute  the   article 
raised  or  manufactured.     These  three  divisions  I  shall  speak 
of  as  one  body.     Property  is  accumulated  labor ;  wealth  or 
riches  a  great  deal  of  accumulated  labor.     As  a   general 
rule,  merchants  are  the  only  men  who  become  what  we 
call  rich.     There  are  exceptions,  but  they  are  rare,  and  do 
not  affect  the   remarks  which  are  to  follow.     It  is  seldom 
that  a  man  becomes  rich  by  his  own  labor  employed   in 
producing  or   manufacturing.     It    is   only   by   using   other 
men's  labor  that  any  one  becomes  rich.     A  man's  hands 
will   give  him  sustenance,   not  affluence.     In    the   present 
condition  of  society  this  is  unavoidable ;   I   do   not  say  in 
a  normal  condition,  but  in  the  present  condition. 

Here  in  America  the  position  of  this  class  is  the  most 
powerful  and  commanding  in  society.  They  own  most  of 
the  property  of  the  nation.  The  wealthy  men  are  of  this 
class;  in  practical  skill,  administrative  talent,  in  power  to 
make  use  of  the  labor  of  other  men,  they  surpass  all  others. 
Now,  wealth  is  power,  and  skill  is  power  —  both  to  a 
degree  unknown  before.  This  skill  and  wealth  are  more 
powerful  with  us  than  any  other  people,  for  there  is  no 
privileged  caste,  priest,  king,  or  noble,  to  balance  against 
them.  The  strong  hand  has  given  way  to  the  able  and 


168  SERMON    OF    ME11CHANTS. 

accomplished  head.  Once  head  armor  was  worn  on  the 
outside,  and  of  brass,  now  it  is  internal  and  of  brains. 

To  this  class  belongs  the  power  both  of  skill  and  of 
wealth,  and  all  the  advantages  which  they  bring.  It  was 
never  so  before  in  the  whole  history  of  man.  It  is  more  so 
in  the  United  States  than  in  any  other  place.  I  know  the 
high  position  of  the  merchants  in  Venice,  Pisa,  Florence, 
Nuremberg  and  Basel,  in  the  middle  ages  and  since. 
Those  cities  were  gardens  in  a  wilderness,  but  a  fringe  of 
soldiers  hung  round  their  turreted  walls;  the  trader  was 
dependent  on  the  fighter,  and  though  their  merchants 
became  princes,  they  were  yet  indebted  to  the  sword,  and 
not  entirely  to  their  calling,  for  defence.  Their  palaces 
were  half  castles,  and  their  ships  full  of  armed  men.  Be- 
sides those  were  little  States.  Here  the  merchant's  power 
is  wholly  in  his  gold  and  skill.  Rome  is  the  city  of  priests ; 
Vienna  for  nobles  ;  Berlin  for  scholars  ;  the  American  cities 
for  merchants.  In  Italy  the  roads  are  poor,  the  banking- 
houses  humble ;  the  cots  of  the  laborer  mean  and  bare,  but 
churches  and  palaces  are  beautiful  and  rich.  God  is  painted 
as  a  pope.  Generally  in  Europe,  the  clergy,  the  soldiers, 
and  the  nobles  are  the  controlling  class.  The  finest  works 
of  art  belong  to  them,  represent  them,  and  have  come  from 
the  corporation  of  priests,  or  the  corporation  of  fighters. 
Here  a  new  era  is  getting  symbolized  in  our  works  of  art. 
They  are  banks,  exchanges,  custom-houses,  factories,  rail- 
roads. These  come  of  the  corporation  of  merchants ; 
trade  is  the  great  thing.  Nobody  tries  to  secure  the  favor 
of  the  army  or  navy  —  but  of  the  merchants. 

Once  there  was  a  permanent  class  of  fighters.  Their 
influence  was  supreme.  They  had  the  power  of  strong 
arms,  of  disciplined  valor,  and  carried  all  before  them. 
They  made  the  law  and  broke  it.  Men  complained,  grum- 
bling in  their  beard,  but  got  no  redress.  They  it  was  that 
possessed  the  wealth  of  the  land.  The  producer,  the 
manufacturer,  the  distributor  could  not  get  rich :  only  the 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  169 

soldier,  the  armed  thief,  the  robber.  With  wealth  they  got 
its  power ;  by  practice  gained  knowledge,  and  so  the  power 
thereof;  or,  when  that  failed,  bought  it  of  the  clergy,  the 
only  class  possessing  literary  and  scientific  skill.  They 
made  their  calling  "  noble,"  and  founded  the  aristocracy  of 
soldiers.  Young  men  of  talent  took  to  arms.  Trade  was 
despised  and  labor  was  menial.  Their  science  is  at  this 
day  the  science  of  kings.  When  graziers  travel  they  look 
at  cattle  ;  weavers  at  factories  ;  philanthropists  at  hospitals  ; 
dandies  at  their  equals  and  coadjutors  ;  and  kings  at  armies. 
Those  fighters  made  the  world  think  that  soldiers  were  our 
first  men,  and  murder  of  their  brothers  the  noblest  craft  in 
the  world ;  the  only  honorable  and  manly  calling.  The 
butcher  of  swine  and  oxen  was  counted  vulgar  —  the  butcher 
of  men  and  women  great  and  honorable.  Foolish  men  of 
the  past  think  so  now  ;  hence  their  terror  at  orations  against 
war ;  hence  their  admiration  for  a  red  coat ;  their  zeal  for 
some  symbol  of  blood  in  their  family  arms ;  hence  their 
ambition  for  military  Titles  when  abroad.  Most  foolish  men 
are  more  proud  of  their  ambiguous  Norman  ancestor  who 
fought  at  the  battle  of  Hastings  —  or  fought  not  —  than  of 
all  the  honest  mechanics  and  farmers  who  have  since 
ripened  on  the  family  tree.  The  day  of  the  soldiers  is  well 
nigh  over.  The  calling  brings  low  wages  and  no  honor. 
It  opens  with  us  no  field  for  ambition.  A  passage  of  arms 
is  a  passage  that  leads  to  nothing.  That  class  did  their 
duty  at  that  time.  They  founded  the  aristocracy  of  sol- 
diers—  their  symbol  the  sword.  Mankind  would  not  stop 
there.  Then  came  a  milder  age  and  established  the  aristoc- 
racy of  birth  —  its  symbol  the  cradle,  for  the  only  merit  of 
that  sort  of  nobility,  and  so  its  only  distinction,  is  to  have 
been  born.  But  mankind  who  stopped  not  at  the  sword, 
delays  but  little  longer  at  the  cradle";  leaping  forward  it 
founds  a  third  order  of  nobility,  the  aristocracy  of  gold,  its 
symbol  the  purse.  We  have  got  no  further  on.  Shall  we 
stop  there  ?  There  comes  a  to-morrow  after  every  to-day, 
15 


170  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

and  no  child  of  time  is  just  like  the  last.  The  aristocracy 
of  gold  has  faults  enough,  no  doubt,  this  feudalism  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  But  it  is  the  best  thing  of  its  kind  we 
have  had  yet;  the  wisest,  the  most  human.  We  are  going 
forward  and  not  back.  God  only  knows  when  we  shall 
stop,  and  where.  Surely  not  now,  nor  here. 

Now  the  merchants  in  America  occupy  the  place  which 
was  once  held  by  the  fighters  and  next  by  the  nobles.  In 
our  country  we  have  balanced  into  harmony  the  centripetal 
power  of  the  government,  and  the  centrifugal  power  of  the 
people :  so  have  national  unity  of  action,  and  individual 
variety  of  action  —  personal  freedom.  Therefore  a  vast 
amount  of  talent  is  active  here  which  lies  latent  in  other 
countries,  because  that  harmony  is  not  established  there. 
Here  the  army  and  nayy  offer  few  inducements  to  able  and 
aspiring  young  men.  They  are  fled  to  as  the  last  resort 
of  the  desperate,  or  else  sought  for  their  traditional  glory, 
not  their  present  value.  In  Europe,  the  army,  the  navy, 
the  parliament  or  the  court,  the  church  and  the  learned 
professions  offer  brilliant  prizes  to  ambitious  men.  Thither 
flock  the  able  and  the  daring.  Here  such  men  go  into 
trade.  It  is  better  for  a  man  to  have  set  up  a  mill  than  to 
have  won  a  battle.  I  deny  not  the  exceptions.  I  speak 
only  of  the  general  rule.  Commerce  and  manufactures 
offer  the  most  brilliant  rewards  —  wealth,  and  all  it  brings. 
Accordingly  the  ablest  men  go  into  the  class  of  merchants. 
The  strongest  men  in  Boston,  taken  as  a  body,  are  not 
lawyers,  doctors,  clergymen,  bookwrights,  but  merchants. 
I  deny  not  the  presence  of  distinguished  ability  in  each  of 
those  professions  ;  I  am  now  again  only  speaking  of  the 
general  rule.  I  deny  not  the  presence  of  very  weak  men, 
exceedingly  weak  in  this  class;  their  money  their  only 
source  of  power. 

The  merchants  then  are  the  prominent  class ;  the  most 
respectable,  the  most  powerful.  They  know  their  power, 
but  are  not  yet  fully  aware  of  their  formidable  and  noble 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  171 

position  at  the  head  of  the  nation.  Hence  they  are  often 
ashamed  of  their  calling;  while  their  calling  is  the  source 
of  their  wealth,  their  knowledge,  and  their  power,  and 
should  be  their  boast  and  their  glory.  You  see  signs  of  this 
ignorance  and  this  shame :  there  must  not  be  shops  under 
your  Athenaeum,  it  would  not  be  in  good  taste ;  you  may 
store  tobacco,  cider,  rum,  under  the  churches,  out  of  sight, 
you  must  have  no  shop  there  ;  it  would  be  vulgar.  It  is  not 
thought  needful,  perhaps  not  proper,  for  the  merchant's 
wife  and  daughter  to  understand  business,  it  would  not  be 
becoming.  Many  are  ashamed  of  their  calling,  and  be- 
coming rich  paint  on  the  doors  of  their  coach,  and  engrave 
on  their  seal,  some  lion,  griffin,  or  unicorn  with  partisans 
and  maces  to  suit ;  arms  they  have  no  right  to,  perhaps  have 
stolen  out  of  some  book  of  heraldry.  No  man  paints 
thereon  a  box  of  sugar,  or  figs,  or  candles  couchant ;  a  bale 
of  cotton  rampant ;  an  axe,  a  lapstone,  or  a  shoe  hammer 
saltant.  Yet  these  would  be  noble,  and  Christian  withal. 
The  fighters  gloried  in  their  horrid  craft,  and  so  made  it 
pass  for  noble,  but  with  us  a  great  many  men  would  be 
thought  "the  tenth  transmitter  of  a  foolish  face,"  rather 
than  honest  artists  of  their  own  fortune  ;  prouder  of  being 
born  than  of  having  lived  never  so  manfully. 

In  virtue  of  its  strength  and  position,  this  class  is  the  con- 
trolling one  in  politics.  It  mainly  enacts  the  laws  of  this 
State  and  the  nation ;  makes  them  serve  its  turn.  Acting 
consciously  or  without  consciousness,  it  buys  up  legislators 
when  they  are  in  the  market ;  breeds  them  when  the  market 
is  bare.  It  can  manufacture  governors,  senators,  judges,  to 
suit  its  purposes,  as  easily  as  it  can  make  cotton  cloth.  It 
pays  them  money  and  honors  ;  pays  them  for  doing  its 
work,  not  another's.  It  is  fairly  and  faithfully  represented 
by  them.  Our  popular  legislators  are  made  in  its  image  ; 
represent  its  wisdom,  foresight,  patriotism  and  conscience. 
Your  Congress  is  its  mirror. 

This  class  is  the  controlling  ooe  in  the  churches,  none 


172  SERMON    OF    MKRCHANTS. 

the  less,  for  with  us  fortunately  the  churches  have  no  exist- 
ence independent  of  the  wealth  and  knowledge  of  the 
people.  In  the  same  way  it  buys  up  the  clergymen,  hunt- 
ing them  out  all  over  the  land  ;  the  clergymen  who  will  do 
its  work,  putting  them  in  comfortable  places.  It  drives  off 
such  as  interfere  with  its  work,  saying,  "  Go  starve,  you 
and  your  children!"  It  raises  or  manufactures  others  to 
suit  its  taste. 

The  merchants  build  mainly  the  churches,  endow  theo- 
logical schools  ;  they  furnish  the  material  sinews  of  the 
church.  Hence  the  metropolitan  churches  are  in  general 
as  much  commercial  as  the  shops. 

Now  from  this  position,  there  come  certain  peculifir 
temptations.  One  is  to  an  extravagant  desire  of  wealth. 
They  see  that  money  is  power,  the  most  condensed  and 
flexible  form  thereof.  It  is  always  ready ;  it  will  turn  any 
way.  They  see  that  it  gives  advantages  to  their  children 
which  nothing  else  will  give.  The  poor  man's  son,  however 
well  born,  struggling  for  a  superior  education,  obtains  his 
culture  at  a  monstrous  cost;  with  the  sacrifice  of  pleasure, 
comfort,  the  joys  of  youth,  often  of  eyesight  and  health. 
He  must  do  two  men's  work  at  once  —  learn  and  teach  at 
the  same  time.  He  learns  all  by  his  soul,  nothing  from  his 
circumstances.  If  he  have  not  an  iron  body  as  well  as  an 
iron  head,  he  dies  in  that  experiment  of  the  cross.  The 
land  is  full  of  poor  men  who  have  attained  a  superior  cul- 
ture, but  carry  a  crippled  body  through  all  their  life.  The 
rich  man's  son  needs  not  that  terrible  trial.  He  learns  from 
his  circumstances,  not  his  soul.  The  air  about  him  contains 
a  diffused  element  of  thought.  He  learns  without  knowing 
•it.  Colleges  open  their  doors  ;  accomplished  teachers  stand 
ready  ;  science  and  art,  music  and  literature,  come  at  the 
rich  man's  call.  All  the  outward  means  of  educating,  re- 
fining, elevating  a  child,  are  to  be  had  for  money,  and  for 
money  alone. 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  173 

Then,  too,  wealth  gives  men  a  social  position,  which  noth- 
ing else  save  the  rarest  genius  can  obtain,  and  which  that, 
in  the  majority  of  cases  lacking  the  commercial  conscience, 
is  sure  not  to  get.  Many  men  prize  this  social  rank  above 
every  thing  else,  even  above  justice  and  a  life  unstained. 

Since  it  thus  gives  power,  culture  for  one's  children,  and 
a  distinguished  social  position,  rank  amongst  men,  for  the 
man  and  his  child  after  him,  there  is  a  temptation  to  regard 
money  as  the  great  object  of  life,  not  a  means  but  an  end  ; 
the  thing  n  man  is  to  get  even  at  the  risk  of  getting  nothing 
else.  It  "  answereth  all  things."  Here  and  there  you  find 
a  man  who  has  got  nothing  else.  Men  say  of  such  an  one, 
"  He  is  worth  a  million  !  "  There  is  a  terrible  sarcasm  in 
common  speech,  which  all  do  not  see.  He  is  "  worth  a 
million,"  and  that  is  all ;  not  worth  truth,  goodness,  piety  ; 
not  worth  a  man.  I  must  say,  I  cannot  but  think  there 
are  many  such  amongst  us.  Most  rich  men,  I  am  told, 
have  mainly  gained  wealth  by  skill,  foresight,  industry, 
economy,  by  honorable  painstaking,  not  by  trick.  It  may 
be  so.  I  hope  it  is.  Still  there  is  a  temptation  to  count 
wealth  the  object  of  life  —  the  thing  to  be  had  if  they  have 
nothing  else. 

The  next  temptation  is  to  think  any  means  justifiable 
which  lead  to  that  end,  —  the  temptation  to  fraud,  deceit, 
to  lying  in  its  various  forms,  active  and  passive  ;  the  temp- 
tation to  abuse  the  power  of  this  natural  strength,  or  ac- 
quired position,  to  tyrannize  over  the  weak,  to  get  and  not 
give  an  equivalent  for  what  they  get.  If  a  man  get  from 
the  world  more  than  he  gives  an  equivalent  for,  to  that 
extent  he  is  a  beggar  and  gets  charity,  or  a  thief  and  steals  ; 
at  any  rate,  the  rest  of  the  world  is  so  much  the  poorer  for 
him.  The  temptation  to  fraud  of  this  sort,  in  some  of  its 
many  forms,  is  very  great.  I  do  not  believe  that  all  trade 
must  be  gambling  or  trickery,  the  merchant  a  knave  or  a 
gambler.  I  know  some  men  say  so.  But  I  do  not  be- 
lieve it.  I  know  it  is  not  so  now ;  all  actual  trade,  and 
15* 


174  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

profitable  too,  is  not  knavery.  I  know  some  become  rich 
by  deceit.  I  cannot  but  think  these  are  the  exceptions  ; 
that  the  most  successful  have  had  the  average  honesty  and 
benevolence,  with  more  than  the  average  industry,  foresight, 
prudence  and  skill.  A  man  foresees  future  wants  of  his 
fellows,  and  provides  for  them  ;  sees  new  resources  hitherto 
undeveloped,  anticipates  new  habits  and  wants  ;  turns  wood, 
stone,  iron,  coal,  rivers  and  mountains  to  human  use,  and 
honestly  earns  what  he  takes.  I  am  told,  by  some  of  their 
number,  that  the  merchants  of  this  place  rank  high  as  men 
of  integrity  and  honor,  above  mean  cunning,  but  enterpris- 
ing, industrious  and  far-sighted.  In  comparison  with  some 
other  places,  I  suppose  it  is  true.  Still  I  must  admit  the 
temptation  to  fraud  is  a  great  one  ;  that  it  is  often  yielded  to. 
Few  go  to  a  great  extreme  of  deceit  —  they  are  known  and 
exposed ;  but  many  to  a  considerable  degree.  He  that 
makes  haste  to  be  rich  is  seldom  innocent.  Young  men 
say  it  is  hard  to  be  honest ;  to  do  by  others  as  you  would 
wish  them  to  do  by  you.  I  know  it  need  not  be  so.  Would 
not  a  reputation  for  uprightness  and  truth  be  a  good  capital 
for  any  man,  old  or  young  ? 

This  class  owns  the  machinery  of  society,  in  great  mea- 
sure,—  the  ships,  factories,  shops,  water  privileges,  houses 
and  the  like.  This  brings  into  their  employment  large 
masses  of  working  men,  with  no  capital  but  muscles  or 
skill.  The  law  leaves  the  employed  at  the  employer's 
mercy.  Perhaps  this  is  unavoidable.  One  wishes  to  sell 
his  work  dear,  the  other  to  get  it  cheap  as  he  can.  It 
seems  to  me  no  law  can  regulate  this  matter,  only  con- 
science, reason,  the  Christianity  of  the  two  parties.  One 
class  is  strong,  the  other  weak.  In  all  encounters  of  these 
two,  on  the  field  of  battle,  or  in  the  market-place,  we  know 
the  result :  the  weaker  is  driven  to  the  wall.  When  the 
earthen  and  iron  vessel  strike  together,  we  know  before- 
hand which  will  go  to  pieces.  The  weaker  class  can  sel- 
dom tell  their  tale,  so  their  story  gets  often  suppressed  in 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  175 

the  world's  literature,  and  told  only  in  outbreaks  and  revo- 
lutions. Still  the  bold  men  who  wrote  the  Bible,  Old  Tes- 
tament and  New,  have  told  truths  on  this  theme  which 
others  dared  not  tell  —  terrible  words  which  it  will  take  ages 
of  Christianity  to  expunge  from  the  world's  memory. 

There  is  a  strong  temptation  to  use  one's  power  of  nature 
or  position  to  the  disadvantage  of  the  weak.     This  may  be 
done  consciously  or  unconsciously.     There   are   examples 
enough  of  both.     Here  the  merchant  deals  in  the  labor  of 
men.     This  is  a  legitimate  article  of  traffic,  and  dealing  in 
it  is  quite  indispensable  in  the   present  condition  of  affairs. 
In   the  Southern  States,  the   merchant,  whether  producer, 
manufacturer  or  trader,  owns  men  and  deals  in  their  labor, 
or   their   bodies.     He    uses   their   labor,  giving   them  just 
enough  of  the  result  of  that  labor  to  keep  their  bodies  in 
the  most  profitable  working  state  ;  the  rest  of  that  result  he 
steals  for  his  own  use,  and  by  that  residue  becomes  rich  and 
famous.     He  owns  their  persons  and  gets  their  labor   by 
direct  violence,  though  sanctioned  by  law.     That  is  slavery. 
He  steals  the  man  and  his  labor.     Here  it  is  possible  to  do  a 
similar  thing :  I  mean  it  is  possible  to  employ  men  and  give 
them  just  enough  of  the  result  of  their  labor  to  keep  up  a 
miserable  life,  and  yourself  take  all  the  rest  of  the  result  of 
that  labor.     This  may  be  done  consciously  or  otherwise,  but 
legally,  without  direct  violence,  and  without  owning  the  per- 
son.    This  is  not  slavery,  though  only  one  remove  from  it. 
This  is  the  tyranny  of  the  strong  over  the  weak  ;  the  feudal- 
ism of  money  ;  stealing  a  man's  work,  and  not  his  person. 
The  merchants  as  a  class  are  exposed  to  this  very  tempta- 
tion.    Sometimes  it  is  yielded   to.     Some   large   fortunes 
have  been  made  in  this  way.     Let  me  mention  some  ex- 
treme  cases ;   one   from   abroad,  one   near  at   home.     In 
Belgium  the  average  wages  of  men  in  manufactories  is  less 
than  twenty-seven  cents  a  day.     The  most  skilful  women  in 
that  calling  can  only  earn  twenty  cents  a  day,  and  many 


176  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

very  much  less.*  In  that  country  almost  every  seventh 
man  receives  charity  from  the  public :  the  mortality  of 
operatives,  in  some  of  the  cities,  is  ten  per  cent,  a  year ! 
Perhaps  that  is  the  worst  case  which  you  can  find  on  a  large 
scale  even  in  Europe.  How  much  better  off  are  many 
women  in  Boston  who  gain  their  bread  by  the  needle  ?  yes, 
a  large  class  of  women  in  all  our  great  cities?  The  minis- 
ters of  the  poor  can  answer  that ;  your  police  can  tell  of  the 
direful  crime  to  which  necessity  sometimes  drives  women 
whom  honest  labor  cannot  feed ! 

I  know  it  will  be  said,  "  Buy  in  the  cheapest  market  and 
sell  in  the  dearest ;  get  work  at  the  lowest  wages."  Still 
there  is  another  view  of  the  case,  and  I  am  speaking  to  men 
whose  professed  religion  declares  that  all  are  brothers,  and 
demands  that  the  strong  help  the  weak.  Oppression  of  this 
sort  is  one  fertile  source  of  pauperism  and  crime.  How 
much  there  is  of  it  I  know  not,  but  I  think  men  seldom  cry 
unless  they  are  hurt.  When  men  are  gathered  together  in 
large  masses,  as  in  the  manufacturing  towns,  if  there  is  any 
oppression  of  this  sort,  it  is  sure  to  get  told  of,  especially  in 
New  England.  But  when  a  small  number  are  employed, 
and  they  isolated  from  one  another,  the  case  is  much  harder. 
Perhaps  no  class  of  laborers  in  New  England  is  worse  treated 
than  the  hired  help  of  small  proprietors. 

Then,  too,  there  is  a  temptation  to  abuse  their  political 
power  to  the  injury  of  the  nation,  to  make  laws  which  seem 
good  for  themselves,  but  are  baneful  to  the  people  ;  to  con- 
trol the  churches,  so  that  they  shall  not  dare  rebuke  the 
actual  sins  of  the  nation,  or  the  sins  of  trade,  and  so  the 
churches  be  made  apologizers  for  lowness,  practising  infidel- 
ity as  their  sacrament,  but  in  the  name  of  Christ  and  God. 
The  ruling  power  in  England  once  published  a  volume  of 


*  I  gather  these  facts  from  a  Review  of  Major  Poussin's  Belgique  et 
les  Beiges,  depuis  1830,  in  a  foreign  journal.  The  condition  of  the 
merchant  manufacturer  I  know  not. 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  177 

sermons,  as  well  as  a  hook  of  prayers,  which  the  clergy 
were  commanded  to  preach.  What  sort  of  a  gospel  got 
recommended  therein,  you  may  easily  guess ;  and  what  is 
recommended  by  the  class  of  merchants  in  New  England, 
you  may  as  easily  hear. 

But  if  their  temptations  are  great,  the  opportunities  of  this 
class  for  doing  good  are  greater  still.  Their  power  is  more 
readily  useful  for  good  than  ill,  as  all  power  is.  In  their 
calling  they  direct  and  control  the  machinery,  the  capital 
and  thereby  the  productive  labor  of  the  whole  community. 
They  can  as  easily  direct  that  well  as  ill ;  for  the  benefit  of 
all,  easier  than  to  the  injury  of  any  one.  They  can  discover 
new  sources  of  wealth  for  themselves,  and  so  for  the  nation  ; 
they  can  set  on  foot  new  enterprises,  which  shall  increase 
the  comfort  and  welfare  of  man  to  a  vast  degree,  and  not 
only  that,  but  enlarge  also  the  number  of  men,  for  that 
always  greatens  in  a  nation,  as  the  means  of  living  are 
made  easy.  They  can  bind  the  rivers,  teaching  them  to 
weave  and  spin.  The  introduction  of  manufactures  into 
England,  and  the  application  of  machinery  to  that  purpose, 
I  doubt  not  has  added  some  millions  of  new  lives  to  her  pop- 
ulation in  the  present  century  —  millions  that  otherwise 
would  never  have  lived  at  all.  The  introduction  of  manu- 
factures into  the  United  States,  the  application  of  water- 
power  and  steam-power  to  human  work,  the  construction  of 
canals  and  railroads,  has  vastly  increased  the  comforts  of 
the  living.  It  helps  civilize,  educate  and  refine  men  ;  yes, 
leads  to  an  increase  of  the  number  of  lives.  There  are 
men  to  whom  the  public  owes  a  debt  which  no  money  could 
pay,  for  it  is  a  debt  of  life.  What  adequate  sum  of  gold, 
or  what  honors  could  mankind  give  to  Columbus,  to  Faustus, 
to  Fulton,  for  their  works  ?  He  that  did  the  greatest  service 
ever  done  to  mankind  got  from  his  age  a  bad  name  and  a 
cross  for  his  reward.  There  are  men  whom  mankind  are 


178  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

to  thank  for  thousands  of  lives  ;  yet  men  who  hold  no  lofty 
niche  in  the  temple  of  fame. 

By  their  control  of  the  Legislature  the  merchants  can 
fashion  more  wisely  the  institutions  of  the  land,  promote  the 
freedom  of  all,  break  off  traditionary  yokes,  help  forward 
the  public  education  of  the  people  by  the  establishment  of 
public  schools,  public  academies,  and  public  colleges.  They 
can  frame  particular  statutes  which  help  and  encourage  the 
humble  and  the  weak,  laws  which  prevent  the  causes  of 
poverty  and  crime,  which  facilitate  for  flie  poor  man  the 
acquisition  of  property,  enabling  him  to  invest  his  earnings 
in  the  most  profitable  stocks, —  laws  which  bless  the  living, 
and  so  increase  the  number  of  lives.  They  can  thus  help 
organize  society  after  the  Christian  idea,  and  promote  the 
kingdom  of  heaven.  They  can  make  our  jails  institutions 
which  really  render  their  inmates  better,  and  send  them  out 
whole  men,  safe  and  sound.  We  have  seen  them  do  this 
with  lunatics,  why  not  with  those  poor  wretches  whom  now 
we  murder  ?  They  too  can  found  houses  of  cure  for  drunk- 
ards, and  men  yet  more  unfortunate  when  released  from 
our  prisons. 

By  their  control  of  the  churches,  and  all  our  seminaries, 
public  and  private,  they  can  encourage  freedom  of  thought ; 
can  promote  the  public  morals  by  urging  the  clergy  to  point 
out  and  rebuke  the  sins  of  the  nation,  of  society,  the  actual 
sins  of  men  now  living ;  can  encourage  them  to  separate 
theology  from  mythology,  religion  from  theology,  and  then 
apply  that  religion  to  the  State,  to  society  and  the  individual ; 
can  urge  them  to  preach  both  parts  of  religion  —  morality, 
the  love  of  man,  and  piety,  the  love  of  God,  setting  off  both 
by  an  appeal  to  that  great  soul  who  was  Christianity  in  one 
person.  In  this  way  they  have  an  opportunity  of  enlarging 
tenfold  the  practical  value  of  the  churches,  and  helping 
weed  licentiousness,  intemperance,  want,  and  ignorance 
and  sin,  clean  out  of  man's  garden  here.  With  their  en- 
couragement, the  clergy  would  form  a  noble  army  con- 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  179 

tending  for  the  welfare  of  men  —  the  church  militant,  but 
preparing  to  be  soon  triumphant.  Thus  laboring,  they  can 
put  an  end  to  slavery,  abolish  war,  and  turn  all  the  nation's 
creative  energies  to  production  —  their  legitimate  work. 

Then  they  can  promote  the  advance  of  science,  of  litera- 
ture, of  the  arts  —  the  useful  and  the  beautiful.  We  see 
what  their  famed  progenitors  did  in  this  way  at  Venice, 
Florence;  Genoa.  I  know  men  say  that  art  cannot  thrive 
in  a  republic.  An  opportunity  is  offered  now  to  prove 
the  falsehood  of  that  speech,  to  adorn  our  strength  with 
beauty.  A  great  amount  of  creative,  artistic  talent  is  rising 
here  and  seeks  employment. 

They  can  endow  hospitals,  colleges,  normal  schools,  found 
libraries  and  establish  lectures  for  the  welfare  of  all.  He 
that  has  the  wealth  of  a  king  may  spend  it  like  a  king,  not 
for  ostentation,  but  for  use.  They  can  set  before  men  ex- 
amples of  industry,  economy,  truth,  justice,  honesty,  charity, 
of  religion  at  her  daily  work,  of  manliness  in  life  —  all  this 
as  no  other  men.  Their  charities  need  not  stare  you  in  the 
face  ;  like  violets  their  fragrance  may  reach  you  before  you 
see  them.  The  bare  mention  of  these  things  recalls  the 
long  list  of  benefactors,  names  familiar  to  you  all  —  for 
there  is  one  thing  which  this  city  was  once  more  famous  for 
than,  her  enterprise,  and  that  is  her  Charity  —  the  charity 
which  flows  in  public;  —  the  noiseless  stream  that  shows 
itself  only  in  the  greener  growth  which  marks  its  path. 

Such  are  the  position,  temptations,  opportunities  of  this 
class.  What  is  their  practical  influence  on  Church  and 
State  — on  the  economy  of  mankind  ?  what  are  they  doing 
in  the  nation  ?  I  must  judge  them  by  the  highest  standard 
that  I  know,  the  standard  of  justice,  of  absolute  religion,  not 
out  of  my  own  caprice.  Bear  with  me  while  I  attempt  to 
tell  the  truth,  which  I  have  seen.  If  I  see  it  not,  pity  me 
and  seek  better  instruction  where  you  can  find  it.  But  if  I 
see  a  needed  truth,  and  for  my  own  sake  refuse  to  speak, 


180  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

bear  with  me  no  more.     Bid  me  then  repent.     I  am  speak- 
ing of  men,  strong  men  too,  and  shall  not  spare  the  truth. 

There  is  always  a  conservative  element  in  society ;  yes, 
an  element  which  resists  the  further  application  of  Chris- 
tianity to  public  affairs.  Once  the  fighters  and  their  child- 
ren were  uppermost,  and  represented  that  element.  Then 
the  merchants  were  reformatory,  radical,  in  collision  with 
the  nobles.  They  were  "  Whigs  "  —  the  nobles  were  "To- 
ries." The  merchants  formed  themselves  into  companies, 
and  got  power  from  the  crown  to  protect  themselves  against 
the  nobles,  whom  the  crown  also  feared.  It  is  so  in  England 
now.  The  great  revolution  in  the  laws  of  trade  lately 
effected  there,  was  brought  about  by  the  merchants,  though 
opposed  by  the  lords.  The  anti-corn  law  league  was  a 
trades-union  of  merchants  contending  against  the  owners  of 
the  soil.  There  the  lord  of  land,  and  by  birth,  is  slowly 
giving  way  to  the  lord  of  money,  who  is  powerful  by  his 
knowledge  or  his  wealth.  There  will  always  be  such  an  ele- 
ment in  society.  Here  I  think  it  is  represented  by  the 
merchants.  They  are  backward  in  all  reforms,  excepting 
such  as  their  own  interest  demands.  Thus  they  are  blind 
to  the  evils  of  slavery,  at  least  silent  about  them.  How  few 
commercial  or  political  newspapers  in  the  land  ever  seriously 
oppose  this  great  national  wickedness !  Nay,  how  many  of 
them  favor  its  extension  and  preservation  !  A  few  years 
ago,  in  this  very  city,  a  mob  of  men,  mainly  from  this  class, 
it  is  said,  insulted  honest  women  peaceably  met  to  consult 
for  the  welfare  of  Christian  slaves  in  a  Christian  land  —  met 
to  pray  for  them  !  A  merchant  of  this  city  says  publicly, 
that  a  large  majority  of  his  brethren  would  kidnap  a  fugitive 
slave  in  Boston  ;  says  it  with  no  blush  and  without  contra- 
diction.* It  was  men  of  this  class  who  opposed  the  abolition 


*  Subsequent  events  {in  1850  and  1851)  show  that  he  was  right  in 
his  statement.  What  was  thought  calumny  then  has  become  history 
since,  and  is  now  the  glory  and  boast  of  Boston. 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  181 

of  the  slave-trade,  and  had  it  guaranteed  them  for  twenty 
years  after  the  formation  of  the  Constitution;  through  their 
instigation  that  this  foul  blot  was  left  to  defile  the  Republic 
and  gather  blackness  from  age  to  age ;  through  their  means 
that  the  nation  stands  before  the  world  pledged  to  maintain 
it.  They  could  end  slavery  at  once,  at  least  could  end 
the  national  connection  with  it,  but  it  is  through  their 
support  that  it  continues;  that  it  acquires  new  strength,  new 
boldness,  new  territory,  darkens  the  nation's  fame  and  hope, 
delays  all  other  reformations  in  Church  and  State  and  the 
mass  of  the  people.  Yes,  it  is  through  their  influence  that 
the  chivalry,  the  wisdom,  patriotism,  eloquence,  yea,  reli- 
gion of  the  free  States,  are  all  silent  when  the  word  slavery 
is  pronounced. 

The  Senate  of  Massachusetts  represents  this  more  than 
any  other  class.  But  all  last  winter  it  could  not  say  one 
word  against  the  wickedness  of  this  sin,  allowed  to  live  and 
grow  greater  in  the  land.*  Just  before  the  last  election 
something  could  be  said  !  Do  speech  and  silence  mean  the 
same  thing  ? 

This  class  opposed  abolishing  imprisonment  for  debt, 
thinking  it  endangered  trade.  They  now  oppose  the  pro- 
gress of  temperance  and  the  abolition  of  the  gallows.  They 

*  Mr.  Robert  J.  Walker  published  a  letter  in  favor  of  the  annexa- 
tion of  Texas.  In  it  he  said:  "Upon  the  refusal  of  re-annexa- 
tion .  .  .  THE  TARIFF  AS  A  PRACTICAL  MEASURE  FALLS  WHOLLY  AND 
FOR  EVER,  and  we  shall  thereafter  be  compelled  to  resort  to  direct 
taxes  to  support  the  Government."  Notwithstanding  this  foolish 
threat,  a  large  number  of  citizens  of  Massachusetts  remonstrated 
against  annexation.  The  House  of  Representatives,  by  a  large  ma- 
jority, passed  a  resolve  declaring  that  Massachusetts  "  announces 
her  uncompromising  opposition  to  the  further  extension  of  American 
slavery,"  and  "  declares  her  earnest  and  unalterable  purpose  to  use 
every  lawful  and  constitutional  measure  for  its  overthrow  and  entire 
extinction,"  Ace.  But  the  Senate  voted  that  the  resistance  of  the 
State  was  already  sufficient !  The  passage  in  the  text  refers  to  these 
circumstances. 

16 


182  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

see  the  evils  of  war ;  they  cannot  see  its  sin ;  will  sustain 
men  who  help  plunge  the  nation  into  its-present  disgraceful 
and  cowardly  conflict ;  will  encourage  foolish  young  men  to 
go  and  fight  in  this  wicked  war.  A  great  man  said,  or  is 
reported  to  have  said,  that  perhaps  it  is  not  an  American 
habit  to  consider  the  natural  justice  of  a  war,  but  to  count 
its  cost !  A  terrible  saying  that !  There  is  a  Power  which 
considers  its  Justice,  and  will  demand  of  us  the  blood  we 
have  wickedly  poured  out;  blood  of  Americans,  blood  of 
the  Mexicans !  They  favor  indirect  taxation,  which  is  tax- 
ing the  poor  for  the  benefit  of  the  rich  ;  they  continue  to 
support  the  causes  of  poverty ;  as  a  class  they  are  blind  to 
this  great  evil  of  popular  ignorance — the  more  terrible 
evils  of  licentiousness,  drunkenness  and  crime  !  They  can 
enrich  themselves  by  demoralizing  their  brothers.  I  wish  it 
was  an  American  habit  to  count  the  cost  of  that.  Some 
"  fanatic  "  will  consider  its  justice.  If  they  see  these  evils 
they  look  not  for  their  cause  ;  at  least,  strive  not  to  remove 
that  cause.  They  have  long  known  that  every  year  more 
money  is  paid  in  Boston  for  poison  drink  to  be  swallowed 
on  the  spot,  a  drink  which  does  no  man  any  good,  which 
fills  your  asylums  with  paupers,  your  jails  with  criminals, 
and  houses  with  unutterable  misery  in  father,  mother,  wife 
and  child,  —  more  money  every  year  than  it  would  take  to 
build  your  new  aqueduct  and  bring  abundance  of  water 
fresh  to  every  house !  *  If  they  have  not  known  it,  why 
it  was  their  fault,  for  the  fact  was  there  crying  to  Heaven 
against  us  all.  As  they  are  the  most  powerful  class,  the 
elder  brothers,  American  nobles  if  you  will,  it  was  their 
duty  to  look  out  for  their  weaker  brother.  No  man  has 
strength  for  himself  alone.  To  use  it  for  one's  self  alone, 
that  is  a  sin.  I  do  not  think  they  are  conscious  of  the 
evil  they  do,  or  the  evils  they  allow.  I  speak  not  of  mo- 
tives, only  of  facts. 

*  It  was  then  thought  that  the  aqueduct  would  cost  but  $2,000,000. 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  183 

This  class  controls  the  State.  The  effects  of  that  control 
appear  in  our  legislation.  I  know  there  are  some  noble 
men  in  political  life,  who  have  gone  there  with  the  loftiest 
motives,  men  that  ask  only  after  what  is  right.  I  honor 
such  men  —  honor  them  all  the  more  because  they  seem 
exceptions  to  a  general  rule ;  men  far  above  the  spirit  of 
any  class.  I  must  speak  of  what  commonly  takes  place. 
Our  politics  are  chiefly  mercantile,  politics  in  which  money 
is  preferred,  and  man  postponed.  When  the  two  come  into 
collision,  the  man  goes  to  the  wall  and  the  street  is  left  clear 
for  the  dollars.  A  few  years  ago  in  monarchical  France  a 
report  was  made  of  the  condition  of  the  working  population 
in  the  large  manufacturing  towns  —  a  truthful  report,  but 
painful  to  read,  for  it  told  of  strong  men  oppressing  the 
weak.*  I  do  not  believe  that  such  an  undisguised  statement 
of  the  good  and  ill  could  be  tolerated  in  democratic  America 
no,  not  of  the  condition  of  men  in  New  England ;  and  wha* 
would  be  thought  of  a  book  setting  forth  the  condition  of 
the  laboring  men  and  women  of  the  South?  I  know  very 
well  what  is  thought  of  the  few  men  who  attempt  to  tell  the 
truth  on  this  subject.  I  think  there  is  no  nation  in  Europe, 
except  Russia  and  Turkey,  which  cares  so  little  for  the  class 
which  reaps  down  its  harvests  and  does  the  hard  work. 
When  you  protect  the  rights  of  all,  you  protect  also  the 
property  of  each  and  by  that  very  act.  To  begin  the  other 
way  is  quite  contrary  to  nature.  But  our  politicians  cannot 
say  too  little  for  men,  nor  too  much  for  money.  Take  the 
politicians  most  famous  and  honored  at  this  day,  and  what 
have  they  done  ?  They  have  labored  for  a  tariff,  or  for 
free  trade ;  but  what  have  they  done  for  man  ?  nay,  what 
have  they  attempted  ?  —  to  restore  natural  rights  to  men 
notoriously  deprived  of  them  ;  progressively  to  elevate  their 
material,  moral,  social  condition  ?  I  think  no  one  pretends 

*  I  refer  to  the  Report  of  M.  Villerme,  in  the  Mimoirtt  de  Vln- 
stitut,  Tom.  Ixxi. 


184  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

it.  Even  in  proclamations  for  Thanksgiving  and  days  of 
prayer,  it  is  not  the  most  needy  we  are  bid  remember. 
Public  sins  are  not  pointed  out  to  be  repented  of.  Slave- 
holding  States  shut  up  in  their  jails  our  colored  seamen  soon 
as  they  arrive  in  a  southern  port.  A  few  years  ago,  at  a 
time  of  considerable  excitement  here  on  the  slavery  ques- 
tion, a  petition  was  sent  from  this  place  by  some  merchants 
and  others,  to  one  of  our  Senators,  praying  Congress  to 
abate  that  evil.  For  a  long  time  that  Senator  could  find  no 
opportunity  to  present  the  petition.  You  know  how  much 
was  said  and  what  was  done  !  Had  the  South  demanded 
every  tenth  or  twentieth  bale  of  "  domestics  "  coming  from 
the  North ;  had  a  petition  relative  to  that  grievance  been 
sent  to  Congress,  and  a  Senator  unreasonably  delayed  to 
present  it  —  how  much  more  would  have  been  said  and 
done ;  when  he  came  back  he  would  have  been  hustled  out 
of  Boston !  When  South  Carolina  and  Louisiana  sent  home 
our  messengers  —  driving  them  off  with  reproach,  insult, 
and  danger  of  their  lives  —  little  is  said  and  nothing  done. 
But  if  the  barbarous  natives  of  Sumatra  interfere  with  our 
commerce,  why  we  send  a  ship  and  lay  their  towns  in 
ruins  and  murder  the  men  and  women  !  We  all  know  that 
for  some  years  Congress  refused  to  receive  petitions  relative 
to  slavery ;  and  we  know  how  tamely  that  was  borne  by  the 
class  who  commonly  control  political  affairs  !  What  if  Con- 
gress had  refused  to  receive  petitions  relative  to  a  tariff,  or 
free  trade,  to  the  shipping  interest,  or  the  manufacturing  in- 
terest ?  When  the  rights  of  men  were  concerned,  three 
million  men,  only  the  "  fanatics  "  complained.  The  polit- 
ical newspapers  said  "  Hush  !  " 

The  merchant-manufacturers  want  a  protective  tariff;  the 
merchant-importers,  free  trade  ;  and  so  the  national  politics 
hinge  upon  that  question.  When  Massachusetts  was  a 
carrying  State,  she  wanted  free  trade  ;  now  a  manufactur- 
ing State,  she  desires  protection.  That  is  all  natural  enough  ; 
men  wish  to  protect  their  interests,  whatsoever  they  may  be. 


SERMON    OP    MERCHANTS.  185 

But  no  talk  is  made  about  protecting  the  labor  of  the  rude 
man,  who  has  no  capital,  nor  skill,  nothing  but  his  natural 
force  of  muscles.  The  foreigner  underbids  him,  mono- 
polizing most  of  the  brute  labor  of  our  large  towns  and 
internal  improvements.  There  is  no  protection,  no  talk  of 
protection  for  the  carpenter,  or  the  bricklayer.  I  do  not 
complain  of  that.  I  rejoice  to  see  the  poor  wretches  of  the 
old  world  finding  a  home  where  our  fathers  found  one 
before.  Yet  if  we  cared  for  men  more  than  for  money,  and 
were  consistent  with  our  principles  of  protection,  why  we 
should  exclude  all  foreign  workmen,  as  well  as  their  work, 
and  so  raise  the  wages  of  the  native  hands.  That  would 
doubtless  be  very  foolish  legislation  —  but  perhaps  not,  on 
that  account,  very  strange.  I  know  we  are  told  that  with- 
out protection,  our  hand-worker,  whose  capital  is  his  skill, 
cannot  compete  with  the  operative  of  Manchester  and  Brus- 
sels, because  that  operative  is  paid  but  little.  I  know  not  if 
it  be  true,  or  a  mistake.  But  who  ever  told  us  such  men 
could  not  compete  with  the  slave  of  South  Carolina  who  is 
paid  nothing?  We  have  legislation  to  protect  our  own 
capital  against  foreign  capital ;  perhaps  our  own  labor  against 
the  "  pauper  of  Europe  ;  "  why  not  against  the  slave  labor 
of  the  Southern  States  ?  Because  the  controlling  class 
prefers  money  and  postpones  man.  Yet  the  slave-breeder 
is  protected.  He  has  I  think  the  only  real  monopoly  in  the 
land.  No  importer  can  legally  spoil  his  market,  for  the 
foreign  slave  is  contraband.  If  I  understand  the  matter,  the 
importation  of  slaves  was  allowed,  until  such  men  as  pleased 
could  accumulate  their  stock.  The  reason  why  it  was 
afterwards  forbidden  I  think  was  chiefly  a  mercantile  reason : 
the  slave-breeder  wanted  a  monopoly,  for  God  knows  and 
you  know  that  it  is  no  worse  to  steal  grown  men  in  Africa 
than  to  steal  new  born  babies  in  Maryland,  to  have  them  born 
for  the  sake  of  stealing  them.  Free  labor  may  be  imported, 
for  it  helps  the  merchant-producer  and  the  merchant-manu- 
16* 


186  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

facturer.  Slave  labor  is  declared  contraband,  for  the  mer- 
chant-slave-breeders want  a  monopoly. 

This  same  preference  of  money  over  men  appears  in 
many  special  statutes.  In  most  of  our  manufacturing  com- 
panies the  capital  is  divided  into  shares  so  large  that  a  poor 
man  cannot  invest  therein !  This  could  easily  be  avoided. 
A  man  steals  a  candlestick  out  of  a  church,  and  goes  to  the 
State  Prison  for  a  year  and  a  day.  Another  quarrels  with 
a  man,  maims  him  for  life,  and  is  sent  to  the  common  jail 
for  six  months.  A  bounty  is  paid,  or  was  until  lately,  on 
every  gallon  of  intoxicating  drink  manufactured  here  and 
sent  out  of  the  country.  If  we  begin  with  taking  care  of  the 
rights  of  man,  it  seems  easy  to  take  care  of  the  rights  of 
labor  and  of  capital.  To  begin  the  other  way  is  quite 
another  thing.  A  nation  making  laws  for  the  nation  is  a 
noble  sight.  The  Government  of  all,  by  all  and  for  all,  is  a 
democracy.  When  that  Government  follows  the  eternal 
laws  of  God,  it  is  founding  what  Christ  called  the  kingdom 
of  heaven.  But  the  predominating  class  making  laws  not 
for  the  nation's  good  but  only  for  its  own,  is  a  sad  spectacle ; 
no  reasoning  can  make  it  other  than  a  sorry  sight.  To  see 
able  men  prostituting  their  talents  to  such  a  work,  that  is  one 
of  the  saddest  sights !  I  know  all  other  nations  have  set 
us  the  example,  yet  it  is  painful  to  see  it  followed,  and 
here. 

Our  politics,  being  mainly  controlled  by  this  class,  are 
chiefly  mercantile,  the  politics  of  pedlers.  So  political  man- 
agement often  becomes  a  trick.  Hence  we  have  many 
politicians,  and  raise  a  harvest  of  them  every  year,  that  crop 
never  failing,  party-men  who  can  legislate  for  a  class ;  but 
we  have  scarce  one  great  statesman  who  can  step  before 
his  class,  beyond  his  age,  and  legislate  for  a  whole  nation, 
leading  the  people  and  giving  us  new  ideas  to  incarnate  in 
the  multitude,  his  word  becoming  flesh.  We  have  not 
planters,  but  trimmers !  A  great  statesman  never  came  of 
mercantile  politics,  only  of  politics  considered  as  the  na- 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  187 

tional  application  of  religion  to  life.  Our  political  morals, 
you  all  know  what  they  are,  the  morals  of  a  huckster. 
This  is  no  new  thing,  the  same  game  was  played  long  ago 
in  Venice,  Pisa,  Florence,  and  the  result  is  well  known.  A 
merely  mercantile  politician  is  very  sharp-sighted  and 
perhaps  far-sighted,  but  a  dollar  will  cover  the  whole  field 
of  his  vision  and  he  can  never  see  through  it.  The  number 
of  slaves  in  the  United  States  is  considerably  greater  than 
our  whole  population  when  we  declared  Independence,  yet 
how  much  talk  will  a  tariff  make,  or  a  public  dinner ;  how 
little  the  welfare  of  three  million  men !  Said  I  not  truly, 
our  most  famous  politicians  are,  in  the  general  way,  only 
mercantile  party-men  ?  Which  of  these  men  has  shown  the 
most  interest  in  those  three  million  slaves  ?  The  man  who 
in  the  Senate  of  a  Christian  Republic  valued  them  at  twelve 
hundred  million  dollars !  Shall  respectable  men  say,  "  We 
do  not  care  what  sort  of  a  Government  the  people  have,  so 
long  as  we  get  our  dividends."  Some  say  so ;  many  men 
do  not  say  that,  but  think  so  and  act  accordingly  !  The 
Government,  therefore,  must  be  so  arranged  that  they  get 
their  dividends. 

This  class  of  men  buys  up  legislators,  consciously  or  not, 
and  pays  them,  for  value  received.  Yes,  so  great  is  its 
daring  and  its  conscious  power,  that  we  have  recently  seen 
our  most  famous  politician  bought  up,  the  stoutest  under- 
standing that  one  finds  now  extant  in  this  whole  nineteenth 
century,  perhaps  the  ablest  head  since  Napoleon.  None 
can  deny  his  greatness,  his  public  services  in  times  past,  nor 
his  awful  power  of  intellect.  I  say  we  have  seen  him,  a 
Senator  of  the  United  States,  pensioned  by  this  class,  or  a 
portion  thereof,  and  thereby  put  mainly  in  their  hands ! 
When  a  whole  nation  rises  up  and  publicly  throws  its 
treasures  at  the  feet  of  a  great  man  who  has  stood  forth 
manfully  contending  for  the  nation,  and  bids  him  take  their 
honors  and  their  gold  as  a  poor  pay  for  noble  works,  why 
that  sight  is  beautiful,  the  multitude  shouting  hosanna  to 


188  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

their  King,  and  spreading  their  garments  underneath  his 
feet!  Man  is  loyal,  and  such  honors  so  paid  and  to  such, 
are  doubly  gracious ;  becoming  alike  to  him  that  takes  and 
those  who  give.  Yes,  when  a  single  class,  to  whom  some 
man  has  done  a  great  service  goes  openly  and  makes  a 
memorial  thereof  in  gold  and  honors  paid  to  him,  why  that 
also  is  noble  and  beautiful.  But  when  a  single  class,  in  a 
country  where  political  doings  are  more  public  than  else- 
where in  the  whole  world,  secretly  buys  up  a  man,  in  high 
place  and  world-famous,  giving  him  a  retaining  fee  for  life, 
why  the  deed  is  one  I  do  not  wish  to  call  by  name  !  Could 
such  men  do  this  without  a  secret  shame  ?  I  will  never 
believe  it  of  my  countrymen.*  A  gift  blinds  a  wise  man's 
eyes,  perverts  the  words  even  of  the  righteous,  stopping  his 
mouth  with  gold  so  that  he  cannot  reprove  a  wrong  !  But 
there  is  an  absolute  justice  which  is  neither  bought  nor  sold  ! 
I  know  other  nations  have  done  the  same  and  with  like 
effect.  Fight  with  silver  weapons,  said  the  Delphic  oracle, 
and  you'll  conquer  all.  It  has  always  been  the  craft  of 
despots  to  buy  up  aspiring  talent ;  some  with  a  title  ;  some 
with  gold.  Allegiance  to  the  sovereign  is  the  same  thing  on 
both  sides  of  the  water,  whether  the  sovereign  be  an  eagle 
or  a  guinea.  Some  American,  it  is  said,  wrote  the  Lord's 
Prayer  on  one  side  of  a  dime,  and  the  Ten  Commandments 
on  the  other.  The  Constitution  and  a  considerable  com- 
mentary might  perhaps  be  written  on  the  two  sides  of  a 
dollar ! 

This  class  controls  the  Churches,  as  the  State.  Let  me 
show  the  effect  of  that  control.  I  am  not  to  try  men  in  a 
narrow  way,  by  my  own  theological  standard,  but  by  the 
standard  of  manliness  and  Christianity.  As  a  general  rule, 
the  clergy  are  on  the  side  of  power.  All  history  proves 
this,  our  own  most  abundantly.  The  clergy  also  are  uncon- 

*  This  was  printed  in  1846.  In  1S50,  and  since,  these  men  have 
publicly  gloried  in  a  similar  act  even  more  atrocious. 


SERMON    OP    MERCHANTS.  189 

sciously  bought  up,  their  speech  paid  for,  or  their  silence. 
As  a  class,  did  they  ever  denounce  a  public  sin  ?  a  popular 
sin  ?  Perhaps  they  have.  Do  they  do  it  now  and  here  ? 
Take  Boston  for  the  last  ten  years,  and  I  think  there  has 
been  more  clerical  preaching  against  the  abolitionists  than 
against  slavery ;  perhaps  more  preaching  against  the  tem- 
perance movement  than  in  its  favor.  With  the  exception  of 
disbelieving  the  popular  theology,  your  evangelical  alliance 
knows  no  sin  but  "  original  sin,"  unless  indeed  it  be  "  or- 
ganic sins,"  which  no  one  is  to  blame  for ;  no  sinner  but  • 
Adam  and  the  devil ;  no  saving  righteousness  but  the  "  im- 
puted." I  know  there  are  exceptions,  and  I  would  go  far  to 
do  them  honor,  pious  men  who  lift  up  a  warning,  yes,  bear 
Christian  testimony  against  public  sins.  I  am  speaking  of 
the  mass  of  the  clergy.  Christ  said  the  priests  of  his  time 
had  made  a  den  of  thieves  out  of  God's  house  of  prayer. 
Now  they  conform  to  the  public  sins  and  apologize  for  pop- 
ular crime.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  forgive  an  offence  :  who 
does  not  need  that  favor  and  often  ?  But  to  forgive  the 
theory  of  crime,  to  have  a  theory  which  does  that,  is  quite 
another  thing.  Large  cities  are  alike  the  court  and  camp 
of  the  mercantile  class,  and  what  I  have  just  said  is  more 
eminently  true  of  the  clergy  in  such  towns.  Let  me  give 
an  example.  Not  long  ago  the  Unitarian  clergy  published 
a  protest  against  American  slavery.  It  was  moderate,  but 
firm,  and  manly.  Almost  all  the  clergy  in  the  country 
signed  it.  In  the  large  towns  few  :  they  mainly  young  men 
and  in  the  least  considerable  churches.  The  young  men 
seemed  not  to  understand  their  contract,  for  the  essential 
part  of  an  ecclesiastical  contract  is  sometimes  written  be- 
tween the  lines  and  in  sympathetic  ink.  Is  a  steamboat 
burned  or  lost  on  the  waters,  how  many  preach  on  that 
affliction!  Yet  how  few  preached  against  the  war?  A 
preacher  may  say,  he  hates  it  as  a  man,  no  words  could 
describe  his  loathing  at  it,  but  as  a  minister  of  Christ,  he 
dares  not  say  a  word  !  What  clergymen  tell  of  the  sins  of 


190  SERMON    OP    MERCHANTS. 

Boston,  —  of  intemperance,  licentiousness  ;  who  of  the  ig- 
norance of  the  people  ;  who  of  them  lays  bare  our  public 
sin  as  Christ  of  old  ;  who  tells  the  causes  of  poverty,  and 
thousand-handed  crime ;  who  aims  to  apply  Christianity  to 
business,  to  legislation,  politics,  to  all  the  nation's  life! 
Once  the  church  was  the  bride  of  Christ,  living  by  his  cre- 
ative, animating  love  ;  her  children  were  apostles,  prophets, 
men  by  the  same  spirit  variously  inspired  with  power  to 
heal,  to  help,  to  guide  mankind.  Now  she  seems  the  widow 
•of  Christ,  poorly  living  on  the  dower  of  other  times.  Nay, 
the  Christ  is  not  dead,  and  'tis  her  alimony,  not  her  dower. 
Her  children  —  no  such  heroic  sons  gather  about  her  table  as 
before.  In  her  dotage  she  blindly  shoves  them  off,  not 
counting  men  as  sons  of  Christ.  Is  her  day  gone  by  ? 
The  clergy  answer  the  end  they  were  bred  for,  paid  for. 
Will  they  say,  "  We  should  lose  our  influence  were  we  to 
tell  of  this  and  do  these  things  ?  "  *  It  is  not  true.  Their 
ancient  influence  is  already  gone  !  Who  asks,  "  What  do 
the  clergy  think  of  the  tariff,  or  free  trade,  of  annexation, 
or  the  war,  of  slavery,  or  the  education  movement  ?  "  Why 
no  man.  It  is  sad  to  say  these  things.  Would  God  they 
were  not  true.  Look  round  you,  and  if  you  can,  come  tell 
me  they  are  false. 

We  are  not  singular  in  this.  In  all  lands  the  clergy 
favors  the  controlling  class.  Bossuet  would  make  the  mon- 
archy swallow  up  all  other  institutions,  as  in  history  he 

*  Keble,  in  one  of  his  poems,  represents  a  mother  seeing  her 
sportive  son  "  enacting  holy  rites,"  and  thus  describes  her  emotions  : 

"  She  sees  in  heart  an  empty  throne, 

And  falling,  falling  far  away, 
Him  whom  the  Lord  hath  placed  thereon  : 

She  hears  the  dread  Proclaimer  say, 
'  Cast  ye  the  lot,  in  trembling  cast, 
The  traitor  to  his  place  hath  past,  — 
Strive  ye  with  prayer  and  fast  to  guide 
The  dangerous  glory  where  it  shall  abide.'  " 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  191 

sacrificed  all  nations  to  the  Jews.  In  England  the  estab- 
lished clergy  favors  the  nobility,  the  crown,  not  the  people  ; 
opposes  all  freedom  of  trade,  all  freedom  in  religion,  all 
generous  education  of  the  people ;  its  gospel  is  the  gospel 
for  a  class,  not  Christ's  gospel  for  mankind.  Here  also  the 
sovereign  is  the  head  of  the  church,  it  favors  the  prevailing 
power,  represents  the  morality,  the  piety  which  chances  to 
be  popular,  nor  less  nor  more ;  the  Christianity  of  the 
street,  not  of  Christ. 

Here  trade  takes  the  place  of  the  army,  navy,  and  court 
in  other  lands.  That  is  well,  but  it  takes  also  the  place 
in  great  measure  of  science,  art  and  literature.  So  we 
become  vulgar  and  have  little  but  trade  to  show.  The  rich 
man's  son  seldom  devotes  himself  to  literature,  science,  or 
art ;  only  to  getting  more  money,  or  to  living  in  idleness  on 
what  he  has  inherited.  When  money  is  the  end,  what  need 
to  look  for  any  thing  more  ?  He  degenerates  into  the  class 
of  consumers,  and  thinks  it  an  honor.  He  is  ashamed  of 
his  father's  blood,  proud  of  his  gold.  A  good  deal  of  sci- 
entific labor  meets  with  no  reward,  but  itself.  In  our  coun- 
try this  falls  almost  wholly  upon  poor  men.  Literature, 
science  and  art  are  mainly  in  their  hands,  yet  are  controlled 
by  the  prevalent  spirit  of  the  nation.  Here  and  there  an 
exceptional  man  differs  from  that,  but  the  mass  of  writers 
conform.  In  England,  the  national  literature  favors  the 
church,  the  crown,  the  nobility,  the  prevailing  class.  Ano- 
ther literature  is  rising,  but  is  not  yet  national,  still  less 
canonized.  We  have  no  American  literature  which  is  per- 
manent. Our  scholarly  books  are  only  an  imitation  of  a 
foreign  type ;  they  do  not  reflect  our  morals,  manners, 
politics,  or  religion,  not  even  our  rivers,  mountains,  sky. 
They  have  not  the  smell  of  our  ground  in  their  breath.  The 
real  American  literature  is  found  only  in  newspapers,  and 
speeches,  perhaps  in  some  novel,  hot,  passionate,  but  poor, 
and  extemporaneous.  That  is  our  national  literature. 
Does  that  favor  man  —  represent  man  ?  Certainly  not. 


192  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

All  is  the  reflection  of  this  most  powerful  class.  The  truths 
that  are  told  are  for  them,  and  the  lies.  Therein  the 
prevailing  sentiment  is  getting  into  the  form  of  thought. 
Politics  represent  the  morals  of  the  controlling  class,  the 
morals  and  manners  of  rich  Peter  and  David  on  a  large 
scale.  Look  at  that  index,  you  would  sometimes  think  you 
were  not  in  the  Senate  of  a  great  nation,  but  in  a  board  of 
brokers,  angry  and  higgling  about  stocks.  Once  in  the 
nation's  loftiest  hour,  she  rose  inspired  and  said  :  "  All  men 
are  born  equal,  each  with  unalienable  rights  ;  that  is  self- 
evident."  Now  she  repents  her  of  the  vision  and  the  saying. 
It  does  not  appear  in  her  literature,  nor  church,  nor  state. 
Instead  of  that,  through  this  controlling  classr  the  nation 
says ;  "  All  dollars  are  equal,  however  got ;  each  has  una- 
lienable rights.  Let  no  man  question  that !  "  This  appears 
in  literature  and  legislation,  church  and  state.  The  morals 
of  a  nation,  of  its  controlling  class,  always  get  summed  up 
in  its  political  action.  That  is  the  barometer  of  the  moral 
weather.  The  voters  are  always  fairly  represented. 

The  wicked  baron,  bad  of  heart  and  bloody  of  hand,  has 
passed  off  with  the  ages  which  gave  birth  to  such  a  brood, 
but  the  bad  merchant  still  lives.  He  cheats  in  his  trade  ; 
sometimes  against  the  law,  commonly  with  it.  His  truth  is 
never  wholly  true,  nor  his  lie  wholly  false.  He  overreaches 
the  ignorant ;  makes  hard  bargains  with  men  in  their  trou- 
ble, for  he  knows  that  a  falling  man  will  catch  at  red-hot 
iron.  He  takes  the  pound  of  flesh,  though  that  bring  away 
all  the  life-blood  with  it.  He  loves  private  contracts,  dig- 
ging through  walls  in  secret.  No  interest  is  illegal,  if  he 
can  get  it.  He  cheats  the  nation  with  false  invoices,  and 
swears  lies  at  the  custom-house  ;  will  not  pay  his  taxes,  but 
moves  out  of  town  on  the  last  of  April.*  He  oppresses 

*  It  is  the  custom  in  Massachusetts  to  tax  men  in  the  place  where 
they  reside,  on  the  first  day  of  May ;  as  the  taxes  differ  very  much  in 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  193 

the  men  who  sail  his  ships,  forcing  them  to  be  temperate, 
only  that  he  may  consume  the  value  of  their  drink.  He 
provides  for  them  unsuitable  bread  and  meat.  He  would  not 
engage  in  the  African  slave  trade,  for  he  might  lose  his 
ships  and  perhaps  more  ;  but  he  is  always  ready  to  engage 
in  the  American  slave  trade,  and  calls  you  a  "  fanatic "  if 
you  tell  him  it  is  the  worse  of  the  two.  He  cares  not 
whether  he  sells  cotton  or  the  man  who  wears  it,  if  he  only 
gets  the  money ;  cotton  or  negro,  it  is  the  same  to  him.  He 
would  not  keep  a  drink-hole  in  Ann  Street,  only  own  and 
rent  it.  He  will  bring  or  make  whole  cargoes  of  the  poison 
that  deals  "  damnation  round  the  land."  He  thinks  it  vul- 
gar to  carry  rum  about  in  a  jug,  respectable  in  a  ship.  He 
makes  paupers,  and  leaves  others  to  support  them.  Tell 
not  him  of  the  misery  of  the  poor,  he  knows  better ;  nor  of 
our  paltry  way  of  dealing  with  public  crime,  he  wants  more 
jails  and  a  speedier  gallows.  You  see  his  character  in 
letting  his  houses,  his  houses  for  the  poor.  He  is  a  stone 
in  the  lame  man's  shoe.  He  is  the  poor  man's  devil.  The 
Hebrew  devil  that  so  worried  Job  is  gone ;  so  is  the  brutal 
devil  that  awed  our  fathers.  Nobody  fears  them ;  they 
vanish  before  cock-crowing.  But  this  devil  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  is  still  extant.  He  has  gone  into  trade,  and 
advertises  in  the  papers  ;  his  name  is  "  good  "  in  the  street. 
He  "  makes  money ; "  the  world  is  poorer  by  his  wealth. 
He  spends  it  as  he  made  it,  like  a  devil,  on  himself,  his 
family  alone,  or  worse  yet,  for  show.  He  can  build  a 
church  out  of  his  gains,  to  have  his  morality,  his  Chris- 
tianity preached  in  it,  and  call  that  the  gospel,  as  Aaron 
called  a  calf — God.  He  sends  rum  and  missionaries  to  the 
same  barbarians,  the  one  to  damn,  the  other  to  "  save,"  both 
for  his  own  advantage,  for  his  patron  saint  is  Judas,  the 
first  saint  who  made  money  out  of  Christ.  Ask  not  him  to 

different  towns  of  the  same  State,  it  is  easy  for  a  man  to  escape  the 
burthen  of  taxation. 
17 


194  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

do  a  good  deed  in  private,  "  men  would  not  know  it,"  and 
"  the  example  would  be  lost ;  "  so  he  never  lets  a  dollar  slip 
out  between  his  thumb  and  finger  without  leaving  his  mark 
on  both  sides  of  it.  He  is  not  forecasting  to  discern  effects  in 
causes,  nor  skilful  to  create  new  wealth,  only  spry  in  the 
scramble  for  what  others  have  made.  It  is  easy  to  make  a 
bargain  with  him,  hard  to  settle.  In  politics  he  wants  a 
Government  that  will  insure  his  dividends ;  so  asks  what  is 
good  for  him,  but  ill  for  the  rest.  He  knows  no  right,  only 
power;  no  man  but  self;  no  God  but  his  calf  of  gold. 

What  effect  has  he  on  young  men  ?  They  had  better 
touch  poison.  If  he  takes  you  to  his  heart,  he  takes  you  in. 
What  influence  on  society  ?  To  taint  and  corrupt  it  all  round. 
He  contaminates  trade ;  corrupt  politics,  making  abusive 
laws,  not  asking  for  justice  but  only  dividends.  To  the 
church  he  is  the  Anti-Christ.  Yes  the  very  Devil,  and 
frightens  the  poor  minister  into  shameful  silence,  or  more 
shameless  yet,  into  an  apology  for  crime  ;  makes  him  pardon 
the  theory  of  crime!  Let  us  look  on  that  monster  —  look 
and  pass  by,  not  without  prayer. 

The  good  merchant  tells  the  truth  and  thrives  by  that ;  is 
upright  and  downright ;  his  word  good  as  his  Bible-oath. 
He  pays  for  all  he  takes  ;  though  never  so  rich  he  owns  no 
wicked  dollar  ;  all  is  openly,  honestly,  manfully  earned,  and 
a  full  equivalent  paid  for  it.  He  owns  money  and  is  worth 
a  man.  He  is  just  in  business  with  the  strong;  charitable  in 
dealing  with  the  weak.  His  counting-room  or  his  shop  is 
the  sanctuary  of  fairness,  justice,  a  school  of  uprightness  as 
well  as  thrift.  Industry  and  honor  go  hand  in  hand  with 
him.  He  gets  rich  by  industry  and  forecast,  not  by  slight 
of  hand  and  shuffling  his  cards  to  another's  loss.  No  men 
become  the  poorer  because  he  is  rich.  He  would  sooner 
hurt  himself  than  wrong  another,  for  he  is  a  man,  not  a  fox. 
He  entraps  no  man  with  lies,  active  or  passive.  His  honesty 
is  better  capitaljjthan  a  sharper's  cunning.  Yet  he  makes 
no  more  talk  about  justice  and  honesty  than  the  sun  talks  of 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  195 

light  and  heat ;  they  do  their  own  talking.  His  profession 
of  religion  is  all  practice.  He  knows  that  a  good  man  is 
just  as  near  heaven  in  his  shop,  as  in  his  church,  at  work  as 
at  prayer ;  so  he  makes  all  work  sacramental  ;  he  com- 
munes with  God  and  man  in  buying  and  selling  —  com- 
munion in  both  kinds.  He  consecrates  his  week-day  and 
his  work.  Christianity  appears  more  divine  in  this  man's 
deeds  than  in  the  holiest  words  of  apostle  or  saint.  He 
treats  every  man  as  he  wishes  all  to  treat  him,  and  thinks  no 
more  of  that  than  of  carrying  one  for  every  ten.  It  is  the 
rule  of  his  arithmetic.  You  know  this  man  is  a  saint,  not 
by  his  creed,  but  by  the  letting  of  his  houses,  his  treatment 
of  all  that  depend  on  him.  He  is  a  father  to  defend  the 
weak,  not  a  pirate  to  rob  them.  He  looks  out  for  the 
welfare  of  all  that  he  employs ;  if  they  are  his  help  he  is 
theirs,  and  as  he  is  the  strongest  so  the  greater  help.  His 
private  prayer  appears  in  his  public  work,  for  in  his  devotion 
he  does  not  apologize  for  his  sin,  but  asking  to  outgrow  that, 
challenges  himself  to  new  worship  and  more  piety.  He 
sets  on  foot  new  enterprises  which  develope  the  nation's 
wealth  and  help  others  while  they  help  him.  He  wants 
laws  that  take  care  of  man's  rights,  knowing  that  then  he 
can  take  care  of  himself  and  of  his  own,  but  hurt  no  man  by 
so  doing.  He  asks  laws  for  the  weak,  not  against  them. 
He  would  not  take  vengeance  on  the  wicked,  but  correct 
them.  His  justice  tastes  of  charity.  He  tries  to  remove 
the  causes  of  poverty,  licentiousness,  of  all  crime,  and 
thinks  that  is  alike  the  duty  of  Church  and  State.  Ask  not 
him  to  make  a  statesman  a  party-man,  or  the  churches  an 
apology  for  his  lowness.  He  knows  better ;  he  calls  that 
infidelity.  He  helps  the  weak  help  themselves.  He  is  a 
moral  educator,  a  church  of  Christ  gone  into  business,  a 
saint  in  trade.  The  Catholic  saint  who  stood  on  a  pillar's 
top,  or  shut  himself  into  a  den  and  fed  on  grass,  is  gone  to 
his  place  —  that  Christian  Nebuchadnezzar.  He  got  fame 
in  his  day.  No  man  honors  him  now  ;  nobody  even  imitates 


196  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

him.  But  the  saint  of  the  nineteenth  century  is  the  good 
merchant ;  he  is  wisdom  for  the  foolish,  strength  for  the 
weak,  warning  to  the  wicked,  and  a  blessing  to  all.  Build 
him  a  shrine  in  bank  and  church,  in  the  market  and  the 
exchange,  or  build  it  not,  no  saint  stands  higher  than  this 
saint  of  trade.  There  are  such  men,  rich  and  poor,  young 
and  old ;  such  men  in  Boston.  I  have  known  more  than 
one  such,  and  far  greater  and  better  than  I  have  told  of,  for 
I  purposely  under-color  this  poor  sketch.  They  need  no 
word  of  mine  for  encouragement  or  sympathy.  Have  they 
not  Christ  and  God  to  aid  and  bless  them  ?  Would  that 
some  word  of  mine  might  stir  the  heart  of  others  to  be  such ; 
your  hearts,  young  men.  They  rise  there  clean  amid  the 
dust  of  commerce  and  the  mechanic's  busy  life,  and  stand 
there  like  great  square  pyramids  in  the  desert  amongst  the 
Arabians'  shifting  tents.  Look  at  them,  ye  young  men,  and 
be  healed  of  your  folly.  It  is  not  the  calling  which  corrupts 
the  man,  but  the  men  the  calling.  The  most  experienced 
will  tell  you  so.  I  know  it  demands  manliness  to  make  a 
man,  but  God  sent  you  here  to  do  that  work. 

The  duty  of  this  class  is  quite  plain.  They  control  the 
wealth,  the  physical  strength,  the  intellectual  vigor  of  the 
nation.  They  now  display  an  energy  new  and  startling. 
No  ocean  is  safe  from  their  canvass  :  they  fill  the  valleys ; 
they  level  the  hills ;  they  chain  the  rivers  ;  they  urge  the 
willing  soil  to  double  harvests.  Nature  opens  all  her  stores 
to  them  ;  like  the  fabled  dust  of  Egypt  her  fertile  bosom 
teems  with  new  wonders,  new  forces  to  toil  for  man.  No 
race  of  men  in  times  of  peace  ever  displayed  so  manly  an 
enterprise,  an  energy  so  vigorous  as  this  class  here  in 
America.  Nothing  seems  impossible  to  them.  The  instinct 
of  production  was  never  so  strong  and  creative  before. 
They  are  proving  that  peace  can  stimulate  more  than 
war. 

Would  that   my  words   could   reach   all  of   this   class. 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  197 

Think  not  I  love  to  speak  hard  words,  and  so  often  ;  say 
not  that  I  am  setting  the  poor  against  the  rich.  It  is  no  such 
thing.  I  am  trying  to  set  the  strong  in  favor  of  the  weak. 
I  speak  for  man.  Are  you  not  all  brothers,  rich  or  poor  ? 
I  am  here  to  gratify  no  vulgar  ambition,  but  in  Religion's 
name  to  tell  their  duty  to  the  most  powerful  class  in  all  this 
land.  I  must  speak  the  truth  I  know,  though  I  may  recoil 
with  trembling  at  the  words  I  speak  ;  yes,  though  their 
flame  should  scorch  my  own  lips.  Some  of  the  evils  I  com- 
plain of  are  your  misfortune,  not  your  fault.  Perhaps  the 
best  hearts  in  the  land,  no  less  than  the  ablest  heads,  are 
yours.  If  the  evils  be  done  unconsciously,  then  it  will  be 
greatness  to  be  higher  than  society,  and  with  your  good 
overcome  its  evil.  All  men  see  your  energy,  your  honor, 
your  disciplined  intellect.  Let  them  see  your  goodness, 
justice,  Christianity.  The  age  demands  of  you  a  devel- 
opment of  religion  proportionate  with  the  vigor  of  your 
mind  and  arms.  Trade  is  silently  making  a  wonderful  rev- 
olution. We  live  in  the  midst  of  it,  and  therefore  see  it 
not.  All  property  has  become  movable,  and  therefore 
power  departs  from  the  family  of  the  first-born,  and  comes 
to  the  family  of  mankind.  God  only  controls  this  revolu- 
tion, but  you  can  help  it  forward,  or  retard  it.  The  freedom 
of  labor,  and  the  freedom  of  trade,  will  work  wonders  little 
dreamed  of  yet ;  one  is  now  uniting  all  men  of  the  same 
nation  ;  the  other,  some  day,  will  weave  all  tribes  together 
into  one  mighty  family.  Then  who  shall  dare  break  its 
peace  ?  I  cannot  now  stop  to  tell  half  the  proud  achieve- 
ments I  foresee  resulting  from  the  fierce  energy  that  ani- 
mates your  yet  unconscious  hearts.  Men  live  faster  than 
ever  before.  Life,  like  money,  like  mechanical  power,  is 
getting  intensified  and  condensed.  The  application  of  sci- 
ence to  the  arts,  the  use  of  wind,  water,  steam,  electricity, 
for  human  works,  is  a  wonderful  fact,  far  greater  than  the 
fables  of  old  time.  The  modern  Cadmus  has  yoked  fire 
and  water  in  an  iron  bond.  The  new  Prometheus  sends 


198  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

the  fire  of  heaven  from  town  to  town  to  run  his  errands. 
We  talk  by  lightning.  Even  now  these  new  achievements 
have  greatly  multiplied  the  powers  of  men.  They  belong 
to  no  class ;  like  air  and  water  they  are  the  property  of 
mankind.  It  is  for  you,  who  own  the  machinery  of  society, 
to  see  that  no  class  appropriates  to  itself  what  God  meant 
for  all.  Remember  it  is  as  easy  to  tyrannize  by  machinery 
as  by  armies,  and  as  wicked  ;  that  it  is  greater  now  to  bless 
mankind  thereby,  than  it  was  of  old  to  conquer  new  realms. 
Let  men  not  curse  you,  as  the  old  nobility,  and  shake  you 
ofF,  smeared  with  blood  and  dust.  Turn  your  power  to 
goodness,  its  natural  transfiguration,  and  men  shall  bless 
your  name,  and  God  bless  your  soul.  If  you  control  the 
nation's  politics,  then  it  is  your  duty  to  legislate  for  the 
nation,  —  for  man.  You  may  develope  the  great  national 
idea,  the  equality  of  all  men  ;  may  frame  a  government 
which  shall  secure  man's  unalienable  rights.  It  is  for  you 
to  organize  the  rights  of  man,  thus  balancing  into  harmony 
the  man  and  the  many,  to  organize  the  rights  of  the  hand, 
the  head,  and  the  heart.  If  this  be  not  done,  the  fault  is 
yours.  If  the  nation  play  the  tyrant  over  her  weakest  child, 
if  she  plunder  and  rob  the  feeble  Indian,  the  feebler  Mex- 
ican, the  Negro,  feebler  yet.  why  the  blame  is  yours. 
Remember  there  is  a  God  who  deals  justly  with  strong  and 
weak.  The  poor  and  the  weak  have  loitered  behind  in  the 
march  of  man ;  our  cities  yet  swarm  with  men  half-savage. 
It  is  for  you,  ye  elder  brothers,  to  lead  forth  the  weak  and 
poor!  If  you  do  the  national  duty  that  devolves  on  you, 
then  are  you  the  saviours  of  your  country,  and  shall  bless 
not  that  alone,  but  all  the  thousand  million  sons  of  men. 
Toil  then  for  that.  If  the  church  is  in  your  hands,  then 
make  it  preach  the  Christian  truth.  Let  it  help  the  free 
development  of  religion  in  the  self-consciousness  of  man, 
with  Jesus  for  its  pattern.  It  is  for  you  to  watch  over  this 
work,  promote  it,  not  retard.  Help  build  the  American 
church.  The  Roman  church  has  been,  we  know  what  it 


SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS.  199 

was,  and  what  men  it  bore ;  the  English  church  yet  stands, 
we  know  what  it  is.  But  the  church  of  America  —  which 
shall  represent  American  vigor  aspiring  to  realize  the  ideas 
of  Christianity,  of  absolute  religion,  —  that  is  not  yet.  No 
man  has  come  with  pious  genius  fit  to  conceive  its  litany,  to 
chant  its  mighty  creed,  and  sing  its  beauteous  psalm.  The 
church  of  America,  the  church  of  freedom,  of  absolute 
religion,  the  church  of  mankind,  where  Truth,  Goodness, 
Piety,  form  one  trinity  of  beauty,  strength,  and  grace  — 
when  shall  it  come  ?  Soon  as  we  will.  It  is  yours  to  help 
it  come. 

For  these  great  works  you  may  labor  ;  yes,  you  are 
laboring,  when  you  help  forward  justice,  industry,  when 
you  promote  the  education  of  the  people  ;  when  you  prac- 
tise, public  and  private,  the  virtues  of  a  Christian  man  ; 
when  you  hinder  these  seemingly  little  things,  you  hinder 
also  the  great.  You  are  the  nation's  head,  and  if  the  head 
be  wilful  and  wicked,  what  shall  its  members  do  and  be  ? 
To  this  class  let  me  say  :  Remember  your  Position  at  the 
head  of  the  nation  ;  use  it  not  as  pirates,  but  Americans, 
Christians,  men.  Remember  your  Temptations,  and  be 
warned  in  time.  Remember  your  opportunities  —  such  as 
no  men  ever  had  before.  God  and  man  alike  call  on  you 
to  do  your  duty.  Elevate  your  calling  still  more ;  let  its 
nobleness  appear  in  you.  Scorn  a  mean  thing.  Give  the 
world  more  than  you  take.  You  are  to  serve  the  nation,  not 
it  you ;  to  build  the  church,  not  make  it  a  den  of  thieves,  nor 
allow  it  to  apologize  for  your  crime,  or  sloth.  Try  this 
experiment  and  see  what  comes  of  it.  In  all  things  govern 
yourselves  by  the  eternal  law  of  right.  You  shall  build  up 
not  a  military  despotism,  nor  a  mercantile  oligarchy,  but  a 
State,  where  the  government  is  of  all,  by  all,  and  for  all  ; 
you  shall  found  not  a  feudal  theocracy,  nor  a  beggarly 
sect,  but  the  church  of  mankind,  and  that  Christ  which  is 
the  same  yesterday,  to-day  and  for  ever,  will  dwell  in  it,  to 
guide,  to  warn,  to  inspire,  and  to  bless  all  men.  And  you, 


200  SERMON    OF    MERCHANTS. 

my  brothers,  what  shall  you  become  ?  Not  knaves,  higgling 
rather  than  earn  ;  not  tyrants,  to  be  feared  whilst  living,  and 
buried  at  last  amid  popular  hate,  but  men,  who  thrive  best 
by  justice,  reason,  conscience,  and  have  now  the  blessed- 
ness of  just  men  making  themselves  perfect. 


VIII. 


A  SERMON  OF  THE  DANGEROUS  CLASSES   IN  SOCIETY.     PREACHED  AT 
THE  MELODEON,  ON   SUNDAY,  JANUARY  31,   1P47. 


MATTHEW    ITIH.  12. 

IK  A  MAN  HAVE  AN  HUNDRED  SHEEP,  AND  ONE  OF  THEM  BE  OOSE  ASTRAY,  DOTH  HB 
NOT  LEAVE  THE  NINETY  AXD  N'IXE,  AND  GOETH  INTO  TUB  MOCNTAIN.S,  AND  SKEK- 
ETH  THAT  WHICH  IS  r.ONK  ASTBAY  ? 

WE  are  first  babies,  then  children,  then  youths,  then  men. 
It  is  so  with  the  nation ;  so  with  mankind.  The  human  race 
started  with  no  culture,  no  religion,  no  morals,  even  no  man- 
ners, having  only  desires  and  faculties  within,  and  the  world 
without.  Now  we  have  attained  much  more.  But  it  has 
taken  many  centuries  for  mankind  to  pass  from  primeval 
barbarism  to  the  present  stage  of  comfort,  science,  civiliza- 
tion, and  refinement.  It  has  been  the  work  of  two  hundred 
generations  ;  perhaps  of  more.  But  each  new  child  is  born 
at  the  foot  of  the  ladder,  as  much  as  the  first  child  ;  with 
only  desires  and  faculties.  He  may  have  a  better  physical 
organization  than  the  first  child ;  he  certainly  has  better 
teachers ;  but  he,  in  like  manner,  is  born  with  no  culture, 
no  religion,  no  morals,  even  with  no  manners  ;  born  into 
them,  not  with  them  ;  born  bare  of  these  things  and  naked 
as  the  first  child.  He  must  himself  toil  up  the  ladder  which 
mankind  have  been  so  long  in  constructing  and  climbing 
up.  To  attain  the  present  civilization  he  must  pass  over 
every  point  which  the  race  passed  through.  The  child  of 
the  civilized  man,  born  with  a  good  organization  and  under 


202  SKIIMON    OP    THE 

favorable  circumstances,  can  do  this  rapidly,  and  in  thirty 
or  forty  years  attains  the  height  of  development  which  it 
took  the  whole  human  race  sixty  centuries  or  more  to  arrive 
at.  He  has  the  aid  of  past  experience  and  the  examples  of 
noble  men ;  he  travels  a  road  already  smooth  and  beaten. 
The  world's  cultivation,  so  slowly  and  painfully  achieved, 
helps  civilize  him.  He  may  then  go  further  on,  and  culti- 
vate himself;  may  transcend  the  development  of  mankind, 
adding  new  rounds  to  the  ladder.  So  doing  he  aids  future 
children,  who  will  one  day  climb  above  his  head,  he  possi- 
bly crying  against  them,  —  that  they  climb  only  to  fall,  and 
thereby  sweep  off  him  and  all  below ;  that  no  new  rounds 
can  be  added  to  the  old  ladder. 

Still,  after  all  the  helps  which  our  fathers  have  provided, 
every  future  child  must  go  through  the  same  points  which 
we  and  our  predecessors  passed  through,  only  more  swiftly. 
Every  boy  has  his  animal  period,  when  he  can  only  eat 
and  sleep,  intelligence  slowly  dawning  on  his  mind.  Then 
comes  his  savage  period,  when  he  knows  nothing  of  rights, 
when  all  thine  is  mine  to  him,  if  he  can  get  it.  Then  comes 
his  barbarous  period,  he  is  ignorant  and  dislikes  to  learn  : 
study  and  restraint  are  irksome.  He  hates  the  school,  diso- 
beys his  mother;  has  reverence  for  nobody.  Nothing  is 
sacred  to  him  —  no  time,  nor  place,  nor  person.  He  would 
grow  up  wild.  The  greater  part  of  children  travel  beyond 
this  stage.  The  unbearable  boy  becomes  a  tolerable  youth ; 
then  a  powerful  man.  He  loves  his  duty;  outstrips  the  men 
that  once  led  him  so  unwilling  and  reluctant,  and  will  set 
hard  lessons  for  his  grandsire  which  that  grandsire,  per- 
haps, will  not  learn.  The  young  learns  of  the  old,  mounts 
the  ladder  they  mounted  and  the  ladder  they  made.  The  ' 
reverse  is  seldom  true,  that  the  old  climbs  the  ladder  which 
the  young  have  made,  and  over  that  storms  new  heights. 
Now  and  then  you  see  it,  but  such  are  extraordinary  and 
marvellous  men.  In  the  old  story  Saturn  did  not  take  pains 
to  understand  his  children,  nor  learn  thereof;  he  only  de- 


• 

DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY,  203 

voured  them  up,  till  some  outgrew  and  overmastered  him. 
Did  the  generation  that  is  passing  from  the  stage  ever  com- 
prehend and  fairly  judge  the  new  generation  coming  on  ? 
In  the  world,  the  barbarian  passes  on  and  becomes  the  civi- 
lized, then  the  enlightened. 

In  the  physical  process  of  growth  from  the  baby  to  the 
man,  there  is  no  direct  intervention  of  the  will.  Therefore 
the  process  goes  on  regularly,  and  we  do  not  see  abortive 
men  who  have  advanced  in  years,  but  stopped  growth  in 
their  babyhood,  or  boyhood.  But  as  the  will  is  the  soul  of 
personality,  so  to  say,  the  heart  of  intellect,  morals  and 
religion,  so  the  force  thereof  may  promote,  retard,  disturb, 
and  perhaps  for  a  time  completely  arrest  the  progress  of 
intellectual,  moral  and  religious  growth.  Still  more,  this 
spiritual  development  of  men  is  hindered  or  promoted  by 
subtle  causes  hitherto  little  appreciated.  Hence,  by  reason 
of  these  outward  or  internal  hindrances,  you  find  persons 
and  classes  of  men  who  do  not  attain  the  average  culture 
of  mankind,  but  stop  at  some  lower  stage  of  this  spiritual 
development,  or  else  loiter  behind  the  rest.  You  even  find 
whole  nations  whose  progress  is  so  slow,  that  they  need  the 
continual  aid  of  the  more  civilized  to  quicken  their  growth. 
Outward  circumstances  have  a  powerful  influence  on  this 
development.  If  a  single  class  in  a  nation  lingers  behind 
the  rest,  the  cause  thereof  will  commonly  be  found  in  some 
outward  hindrance.  They  move  in  a  resisting  medium, 
and  therefore  with  abated  speed.  No  one  expects  the  same 
progress  from  a  Russian  serf  and  a  free  man  of  New  Eng- 
land. I  do  not  deny  that  in  the  case  of  some  men  personal 
will  is  doubtless  the  disturbing  force.  I  am  not  now  to  go 
beyond  that  fact,  and  inquire  how  the  will  became  as  it  is. 
Here  is  a  man  who,  from  whatever  cause,  is  bodily  ill-born, 
with  defective  organs.  He  stops  in  the  animal  period  ;  is 
incapable  of  any  considerable  degree  of  development,  in- 
tellectual, moral,  or  religious.  The  defect  is  in  his  body. 
Others  disturbed  by  more  occult  causes  do  not  attain  their 


204  SERMON    OF    THE 

proper  growth.  This  man  wishes  to  stop  in  his  savage 
period,  he  would  be  a  freebooter,  a  privateer  against  society, 
having  universal  letters-of- marque  and  reprisal  —  a  per- 
petual Arab,  his  rule  is  to  get  what  he  can,  as  he  will 
and  where  he  pleases ;  to  keep  what  he  gets.  Another 
stops  at  the  barbarous  age.  He  is  lazy  and  will  not  work, 
others  must  bear  his  share  of  the  general  burthen  of  man- 
kind. He  claims  letters  patent  to  make  all  men  serve  him. 
He  is  not  only  indolent,  constitutionally  lazy,  but  lazy, 
consciously  and  wilfully  idle.  He  will  not  work,  but  in  one 
form  or  another  will  beg  or  steal.  Yet  a  fourth  stops  in 
the  half-civilized  period.  He  will  work  with  his  hands,  but 
no  more.  He  cannot  discover ;  he  will  not  study  to  learn  ; 
he  will  not  even  be  taught  what  has  been  invented  and  taught 
before.  None  can  teach  him.  The  horse  is  led  to  the  water, 
or  the  water  brought  to  the  horse,  but  the  beast  will  not 
drink.  "  The  idle  fool  is  whipt  at  school,"  but  to  no  purpose. 
He  is  always  an  oaf.  No  college  or  tutor  mends  him.  The 
wild  ass  will  go  out  free,  wild,  and  an  ass. 

These  four,  the  idiot,  the  pirate,  the  thief,  and  the  clown 
are  exceptional  men.  They  remain  stationary.  Meanwhile, 
mankind  advances,  continually,  but  not  with  an  even  front. 
The  human  race  moves  not  by  column  or  line,  but  by 
echelon  as  it  were.  We  go  up  by  stairs,  not  by  slopes. 
Now  comes  a  great  man,  of  far-reaching  and  prospective 
sight,  a  Moses,  and  he  tells  men  that  there  is  a  land  of 
promise,  which  they  have  a  right  to  who  have  skill  to  win 
it.  Then  lesser  men,  the  Calebs  and  Joshuas,  go  and  search 
it  out,  bringing  back  therefrom  new  wine  in  the  cluster  and 
alluring  tales.  Next  troops  of  pioneers  advance,  yet  lesser 
men ;  then  a  few  bold  men  who  love  adventure.  Then 
comes  the  army,  the  people  with  their  flocks  and  herds,  the 
priesthood  with  their  ark  of  the  covenant  and  the  tabernacle, 
the  title-deeds  of  the  new  lands  which  they  have  heard  of 
but  not  seen.  At  last  there  comes  the  mixed  multitude, 
following  in  no  order,  but  not  without  shouting  and  tumult, 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  205 

men  treading  one  another  under  foot,  cowards  looking  back 
and  refusing  to  march,  old  men  dying  without  seeing  their 
consolation.  If  you  will  lie  down  on  the  ground  and  take 
the  profile  of  a  great  city,  and  see  how  hill,  steeple,  dome, 
tower,  the  roof  of  the  tall  house  gain  on  the  sky,  and  then 
come  whole  streets  of  warehouses  and  shops,  then  common 
dwellings,  then  cheap,  low  tenements,  you  will  have  a  good 
profile  of  man's  march  to  gain  new  conquests  in  science,  art, 
morals,  religion,  and  general  development.  It  is  so  in  the 
family,  a  bright  boy  shooting  before  all  the  rest,  and  taking 
the  thunder  out  of  the  adverse  cloud  for  his  brothers  and 
sisters,  who  follow  and  grow  rich  with  unscathed  forehead. 
It  is  so  in  the  nation,  a  few  great  men  bearing  the  brunt  of 
the  storm,  and  wading  through  the  surges  to  set  their  weaker 
brothers,  screaming  and  struggling,  with  dry  feet,  in  safety, 
on  the  firm  land  of  science-  or  religion.  It  is  so  in  the 
world,  a  tall  nation  achieving  art,  science,  law,  morals, 
religion,  and  by  the  fact  revealing  their  beauty  to  the  bar- 
barian race. 

In  all  departments  of  human  concern  there  are  such 
pioneers  for  the  family,  the  nation,  or  mankind.  It  is  instruc- 
tive to  study  this  law  of  human  progress,  to  see  the  De 
Gamas  and  Columbuses,  aspiring  men  who  dream  of  worlds 
to  come  and  lead  the  perilous  van ;  to  see  the  Vespuccis, 
the  Cortes,  the  Pizarros,  who  get  rank  and  fame  by  follow- 
ing in  their  track ;  to  see  next  the  merchant  adventurers, 
soldiers,  suttlers  and  the  like,  who  make  money  out  of  the 
new  conquest,  while  the  great  discoverers  had  for  meet 
reward  the  joy  of  their  genius,  the  nobleness  of  their  work, 
a  sight  of  the  world's  future  welfare  from  the  prophet's 
mountain  —  a  hard  life,  a  bad  name,  and  a  grave  unknown. 

Now  while  there  are  those  men  in  the  van  of  society, 
who  aspire  at  more,  chiding  and  taxing  mankind  with  idle- 
ness, cowardice,  and  even  sin,  there  are  yet  those  others 
who  loiter  on  the  way,  from  weakness  or  wilfulness,  refus- 
ing to  advance  —  idlers,  cowards,  sinners.  If  born  in  the 
18 


206  SERMON    OF    THE 

rear  afar  from  civilization,  they  are  left  to  die  —  the  savages, 
the  inferior  races,  the  perishing  classes  of  the  world.  If  bom 
in  the  centre  of  civilization,  for  a  while  they  impede  the 
march  by  actively  hindering  others,  by  standing  in  their 
way,  or  by  plundering  the  rest,  the  dangerous  classes  of 
society.  They  too  are  slain  and  trodden  under  foot  of  men, 
and  likewise  perish. 

In  most  large  families  there  is  a  bad  boy,  a  black  sheep  in 
the  flock,  an  Ishmael  whom  Abraham  will  drive  out  into  the 
wilderness,  to  meet  an  angel  if  he  can  find  one.  That  story 
of  Hagar  and  her  son  is  very  old,  but  verified  anew  each 
year  in  families  and  nations.  So  in  society  there  are 
criminals  who  do  not  keep  up  with  the  moral  advance  of  the 
mass,  stragglers  from  the  march,  whom  society  treats  as 
Abraham  his  base-born  boy,  but  sending  them  off  with  no 
loaf  nor  skin  of  water,  not  even  a  blessing  but  a  curse  ; 
sending  them  off  as  Cain  went,  with  a  bad  name  and  a  mark 
on  their  forehead  !  So  in  the  world  there  are  inferior 
nations,  savage,  barbarous,  half-civilized  ;  some  are  inferior 
in  nature,  some  perhaps  only  behind  us  in  development ;  on 
a  lower  form  in  the  great  School  of  Providence  —  Negroes, 
Indians,  Mexicans,  Irish,  and  the  like,  whom  the  world  treats 
as  Ishmael  and  the  Gibeonites  got  treated  :  now  their  land  is 
stolen  from  them  in  war ;  their  children,  or  their  persons, 
are  annexed  to  the  strong  as  slaves.  The  civilized  con- 
tinually preys  on  the  savage,  re-annexing  their  territory  and 
stealing  their  persons — owning  them  or  claiming  their 
work.  Esau  is  rough  and  hungry,  Jacob  smooth  and  well 
fed.  The  smooth  man  overreaches  the  rough  ;  buys  his 
birthright  for  a  mess  of  pottage  ;  takes  the  ground  from 
underneath  his  feet,  thereby  supplanting  his  brother.  So 
the  elder  serves  the  younger,  and  the  fresh  civilization, 
strong  and  sometimes  it  may  be  wicked  also,  overmasters 
the  ruder  age  that  is  contented  to  stop.  The  young  man 
now  a  barbarian  will  come  up  one  day  and  take  all  our 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  207 

places,  making  us  seem  ridiculous,  nothing  but  timid  con- 
servatives ! 

All  these  three,  the  reputed  pests  of  the  family,  society, 
and  the  world  are  but  loiterers  from  the  march,  bad  boys,  or 
dull  ones.  Criminals  are  a  class  of  such ;  savages  are 
nations  thereof — classes  or  nations  that  for  some  cause  do 
not  keep  up  with  the  movement  of  mankind.  The  same 
human  nature  is  in  us  all,  only  there  it  is  not  so  highly 
developed.  Yet  the  bad  boy,  who  to-day  is  a  curse  to  the 
mother  that  bore  him,  would  perhaps  have  been  accounted 
brave  and  good  in  the  days  of  the  Conqueror  ;  the  danger- 
ous class  might  have  fought  in  the  Crusades  and  been 
reckoned  soldiers  of  the  Lord  whose  chance  for  heaven  was 
most  auspicious.  The  savage  nations  would  have  been 
thought  civilized  in  the  days  when  "  there  was  no  smith  in 
Israel."  David  would  make  a  sorry  figure  among  the 
present  kings  of  Europe,  and  Abraham  would  be  judged  of 
by  a  standard  not  known  in  his  time.  There  have  been 
many  centuries  in  which  the  pirate,  the  land-robber  and  the 
murderer  were  thought  the  greatest  of  men. 

Now  it  becomes  a  serious  question,  What  shall  be  done 
for  these  stragglers,  or  even  with  them  ?  It  is  sometimes  a 
terrible  question  to  the  father  and  mother  what  they  shall  do 
for  their  reprobate  son  who  is  an  offence  to  the  neighbor- 
hood, a  shame,  a  reproach  and  a  heart-burning  to  them.  It 
is  a  sad  question  to  society,  What  shall  be  done  with  the 
criminals — thieves,  housebreakers,  pirates,  murderers?  It 
is  a  serious  question  to  the  world,  What  is  to  become  of  the 
humbler  nations  —  Irish,  Mexicans,  Malays,  Indians,  Ne- 
groes ? 

In  the  world  and  in  society  the  question  is  answered  in 
about  the  same  way.  In  a  low  civilization,  the  instinct  of 
self-preservation  is  the  strongest  of  all.  They  are  done 
with,  not  for  ;  are  done  away  with.  It  is  the  Old  Testament 
answer:  —  The  inferior  nation  is  hewn  to  pieces,  the  strong 
possess  their  lands,  their  cities,  their  cattle,  their  persons, 


208  SERMON    OP    THE 

also,  if  they  will ;  the  class  of  criminals  gets  the  prophet's 
curse  :  the  two  bears,  the  jail  and  the  gallows,  eat  them  up. 
In  the  family  alone  is  the  Christian  answer  given ;  the  good 
shepherd  goes  forth  to  seek  the  one  sheep  that  has  strayed 
and  gone,  lost  upon  the  mountains  ;  the  father  goes  out  after 
the  poor  prodigal,  whom  the  swine's  meat  could  not  feed 
nor  fill.*  The  world,  which  is  the  society  of  nations,  and 
society,  which  is  the  family  of  classes,  still  belong  mainly  to 
the  "  old  dispensation,"  Heathen  or  Hebrew,  the  period  of 
force.  In  the  family  there  is  a  certain  instinctive  love 
binding  the  parent  to  the  child,  and  therefore  a  certain  unity 
of  action,  growing  out  of  that  love.  So  the  father  feels  his 
kinship  to  his  boy,  though  a  reprobate  ;  looks  for  the  causes 
of  his  son's  folly  or  sin,  and  strives  to  cure  him  ;  at  least  to 
do  something  for  him,  not  merely  with  him.  The  spirit  of 
Christianity  comes  into  the  family,  but  the  recognition  of 
human  brotherhood  stops  mainly  there.  It  does  not  reach 
throughout  society ;  it  has  little  influence  on  national  politics 
or  international  law  —  on  the  affairs  of  the  world  taken  as  a 
whole.  I  know  the  idea  of  human  brotherhood  has  more 
influence  now  than  hitherto ;  I  think  in  New  England  it  has 
a  wider  scope,  a  higher  range,  and  works  with  more  power 
than  elsewhere.  Our  hearts  bleed  for  the  starving  thousands 
of  Ireland,  whom  we  only  read  of;  for  the  down-trodden 
slave,  though  of  another  race  and  dyed  by  Heaven  with 
another  hue  ;  yes,  for  the  savage  and  the  suffering  every- 
where. The  hand  of  our  charity  goes  through  every  land. 
If  there  is  one  quality  for  which  the  men  of  New  England 
may  be  proud  it  is  this,  their  sympathy  with  suffering  man. 
Still  we  are  far  from  the  Christian  ideal.  We  still  drive  out 
of  society  the  Ishmaels  and  Esaus.  This  we  do  not  so 
much  from  ill-will  as  want  of  thought,  but  thereby  we  lose 

*  The  allusion  is  to  the  following  passages  of  Scripture,  which 
were  read  as  the  lesson  for  the  day  ;  Numb.  xiv.  ;  2  Kings,  ii. 
23-25;  and  Luke,  xv. 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  209 

the  strength  of  these  outcasts.     So  much  water  runs  over 
the  dam  —  wasted  and  wasting  ! 

In  all  these  melancholy  cases  what  is  it  best  to  do  ?  what 
shall  the  parents  do  to  mend  their  dull  boy,  or  their  wicked 
one  ?  There  are  two  methods  which  may  be  tried.  One  is 
the  method  of  force,  sometimes  referred  to  Solomon  and 
recommended  by  the  maxim,  "  Spare  not  the  rod  and  spoil 
the  child."  That  is  the  Old  Testament  way,  "  Stripes  are 
prepared  for  the  fool's  back."  The  mischief  is,  they  leave 
it  no  wiser  than  they  found  it.  By  the  law  of  the  Hebrews, 
a  man  brought  his  stubborn  and  rebellious  son  before  the 
magistrates  and  desposed :  "  This  our  son  is  stubborn  and 
rebellious  :  he  will  not  obey  our  voice.  He  is  a  glutton  and 
a  drunkard."  Thereupon,  the  men  of  the  city  stoned  him 
with  stones  and  so  "  put  away  the  evil  from  amongst  them  f " 
That  was  the  method  of  force.  It  may  bruise  the  body  ;  it 
may  fill  men  with  fear ;  it  may  kill.  I  think  it  never  did 
any  other  good.  It  belonged  to  a  rude  and  bloody  age.  1 
may  ask  intelligent  men  who  have  tried  it,  and  I  think  they 
will  confess  it  was  a  mistake.  I  think  I  may  ask  intelligent 
men  on  whom  it  has  been  tried,  and  they  will  say,  "  It  was  a 
mistake  on  my  father's  part,  but  a  curse  to  me  ! "  I  know 
there  are  exceptions  to  that  reply  ;  still  I  think  it  will  be 
general.  A  man  is  seldom  elevated  by  an  appeal  to  low 
motives ;  always  by  addressing  what  is  high  and  manly 
within  him.  Ts  fear  of  physical  pain  the  highest  element 
you  can  appeal  to  in  a  child  ;  the  most  effectual  ?  I  do  not 
see  how  Satan  can  be  cast  out  by  Satan.  I  think  a  Saviour 
never  tries  it.  Yet  this  method  of  force  is  brief  and  com- 
pact. It  requires  no  patience,  no  thought,  no  wisdom  for  its 
application,  and  but  a  moment's  time.  For  this  reason,  I 
think,  it  is  still  retained  in  some  families  and  many  schools, 
to  the  injury  alike  of  all  concerned.  Blows  and  violent 
words  are  not  correction,  often  but  an  adjournment  of 
18* 


210  SERMON    OF    THE 

correction  :  sometimes  only  an  actual  confession  of  inability 
to  correct. 

The  other  is  the  method  of  love,  and  of  wisdom  not  the 
less.  Force  may  hide,  and  even  silence  effects  for  a  time  ; 
it  removes  not  the  real  causes  of  evil.  By  the  method  of 
love  and  wisdom  the  parents  remove  the  causes  ;  they  do 
not  kill  the  demoniac,  they  cast  out  the  demon,  not  by  letting 
in  Beelzebub,  the  chief  devil,  but  by  the  finger  of  God. 
They  redress  the  child's  folly  and  evil  birth  by  their  own 
wisdom  and  good  breeding.  The  day  drives  out  and  off  the 
night. 

Sometimes  you  see  that  worthy  parents  have  a  weak  and 
sickly  child,  feeble  in  body.  No  pains  are  too  great  for 
them  to  take  in  behalf  of  the  faint  and  feeble  one.  What 
self-denial  of  the  father ;  what  sacrifice  on  the  mother's 
part !  The  best  of  medical  skill  is  procured ;  the  tenderest 
watching  is  not  spared.  No  outlay  of  money,  time,  or  sac- 
rifice is  thought  too  much  to  save  the  child's  life  ;  to  insure 
a  firm  constitution  and  make  that  life  a  blessing.  The  able- 
bodied  children  can  take  care  of  themselves,  but  not  the 
weak.  So  the  affection  of  father  and  mother  centres  on 
this  sickly  child.  By  extraordinary  attention  the  feeble  be- 
comes strong ;  the  deformed  is  transformed,  and  the  grown 
man,  strong  and  active,  blesses  his  mother  for  health  not 
less  than  life. 

Did  you  ever  see  a  robin  attend  to  her  immature  and  cal- 
low child  which  some  heedless  or  wicked  boy  had  stolen 
from  the  nest,  wounded  and  left  on  the  ground,  half  living ; 
left  to  perish  ?  Patiently  she  brings  food  and  water,  gives 
it  kind  nursing.  Tenderly  she  broods  over  it  all  night  upon 
the  ground,  sheltering  its  tortured  body  from  the  cold  air  of 
night  and  morning's  penetrating  dew.  She  perils  herself; 
never  leaves  it  —  not  till  life  is  gone.  That  is  nature  ;  the 
strong  protecting  the  feeble.  Human  nature  may  pause 
and  consider  the  fowls  of  the  air,  whence  the  Greatest  once 
drew  his  lessons.  Human  history,  spite  of  all  its  tears  and 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  211 

blood,  is  full  of  beauty  and  majestic  worth.  But  it  shows 
few  things  so  fair  as  the  mother  watching  thus  over  her 
sickly  and  deformed  child,  feeding  him  with  her  own  life. 
What  if  she  forewent  her  native  instinct  and  the  mother 
said,  "My  boy  is  deformed,  a  cripple  —  let  him  die?" 
Where  would  be  the  more  hideous  deformity  ? 

If  his  child  be  dull,  slow-witted,  what  pains  will  a  good 
father  take  to  instruct  him  ;  still  more  if  he  is  vicious,  born 
with  a  low  organization,  with  bad  propensities  —  what  ad- 
monitions will  he  administer  ;  what  teachers  wiH  he  consult ; 
what  expedients  will  he  try  ;  what  prayers  will  he  not  pray 
for  his  stubborn  and  rebellious  son !  Though  one  experi- 
ment fail,  he  tries  another,  and  then  again,  reluctant  to  give 
over.  Did  it  never  happen  to  one  of  you  to  be  such  a  child, 
to  have  outgrown  that  rebellion  and  wickedness  ?  Remem- 
ber the  pains  taken  with  you  ;  remember  the  agony  your 
mother  felt ;  the  shame  that  bowed  your  father's  head  so 
oft,  and  brought  such  bitter  tears  adown  those  venerable 
cheeks.  You  cannot  pay  for  that  agony,  that  shame,  not 
pay  the  hearts  which  burst  with  both  —  yet  uttering  only  a 
prayer  for  you.  Pay  it  back  then,  if  you  can,  to  others  like 
yourself,  stubborn  and  rebellious  sons. 

Has  none  of  you  ever  been  such  a  father  or  mother  ? 
You  know  then  the  sad  yearnings  of  heart  which  tried  you. 
The  world  condemned  you  and  your  wicked  child,  and  said, 
"  Let  the  elders  stone  him  with  stones.  The  gallows  wait- 
eth  for  its  own  !  "  Not  so  you  !  You  said  :  "  Nay,  now, 
wait  a  little.  Perchance  the  boy  will  mend.  Come,  I  will 
try  again.  Crush  him  not  utterly  and  a  father's  heart  be- 
sides !  "  The  more  he  was  wicked,  the  more  assiduous  were 
you  for  his  recovery,  for  his  elevation.  You  saw  that  he 
would  not  keep  up  with  the  moral  march  of  men ;  that  he 
was  a  barbarian,  a  savage,  yes,  almost  a  beast  amongst 
men.  You  saw  this  ;  yes,  felt  it  too  as  none  others  felt. 
Yet  you  could  not  condemn  him  wholly  and  without  hope. 
You  saw  some  good  mixed  with  his  evil  ;  some  causes  for 


212  SERMON    OF    THE 

tlio  evil  an.l  excuses  for  it  which  others  were  blind  to. 
Because  you  mourned  most  you  pitied  most  —  all  from  the 
abundance  of  your  love.  Though  even  in  your  highest 
hour  of  prayer,  the  sad  conviction  came  that  work  or  prayer 
was  all  in  vain  —  you  never  gave  him  over  to  the  world's 
reproach,  but  interposed  your  fortune,  character,  yes,  your 
own  person  to  take  the  blows  which  the  severe  and  tyran- 
nous world  kept  laying  on.  At  last  if  he  would  not  repent, 
you  hid  him  away,  the  best  you  could,  from  the  mocking 
sight  of  other  men,  but  never  shut  him  from  your  heart ; 
never  from  remembrance  in  your  deepest  prayers.  How 
the  whole  family  suffers  for  the  prodigal  till  he  returns. 
When  he  comes  back,  you  rejoice  over  one  recovered  olive- 
plant  more  than  over  all  the  trees  of  your  field  which  no 
storm  has  ever  broke  or  bowed.  How  you  went  forth  to 
meet  him  ;  with  what  joy  rejoiced  !  "  For  this  my  son  was 
lost  and  is  found,"  says  the  old  man  ;  "  he  was  dead  and  is 
alive  once  more.  Let  us  pray  and  be  glad  !  "  With  what  a 
serene  and  hallowed  countenance  you  met  your  friends  and 
neighbors,  as  their  glad  hearts  smiled  up  in  their  faces  when 
the  prodigal  came  home  from  riot  and  swine's-bread,  a  new 
man  safe  and  sound  !  Many  such  things  have  I  seen,  and 
hearts  long  cold  grew  bright  and  warm  again.  Towards 
evening  the  clouds  broke  asunder ;  Simeon  saw  his  conso- 
lation and  went  home  in  sunlight  and  in  peace. 

The  general  result  of  this  treatment  in  the  family  is,  that 
the  dull  boy  learns  by  degrees,  learns  what  he  is  fit  for  :  the 
straggler  joins  the  troop,  and  keeps  step  with  the  rest,  nay, 
sometimes  becomes  the  leader  of  the  march :  the  vicious 
boy  is  corrected  ;  even  the  faults  of  his  organization  get 
overcome,  not  suddenly  but  at  length.  The  rejected  stone 
finds  its  place  on  the  wall,  and  its  use.  Such  is  not  always 
the  result.  Some  will  not  be  mended.  I  stop  not  now  to 
ask  the  cause.  Some  will  not  return,  though  you  go  out  to 
meet  them  a  great  way  off.  What  then  ?  Will  you  refuse 
to  go  ?  Can  you  wholly  abandon  a  friend  or  a  child  who 


DANGEROrS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  213 

thus  deserts  himself?  Is  he  so  bad  that  he  cannot  be  made 
better?  Perhaps  it  is  so.  Can  you  not  hinder  him  from 
being  worse  ?  Are  you  so  good  that  you  must  forsake  him  ? 
Did  not  God  send  his  greatest,  noblest,  purest  Son  to  seek 
and  save  the  lost  ?  send  him  to  call  sinners  to  repent  ? 
When  sinners  slew  him,  did  God  forsake  mankind?  Not 
one  of  those  sinners  did  his  love  forget. 

Does  the  good  physician  spend  the  night  in  feasting  with 
the  sound,  or  in  watching  with  the  sick  ?  Nay,  though  the 
sick  man  be  past  all  hope,  he  will  look  in  to  soothe  affliction 
which  he  cannot  cure  ;  at  least  to  speak  a  word  of  friendly 
cheer.  The  wise  teacher  spends  most  pains  with  backward 
boys,  and  is  most  bountiful  himself  where  Nature  seems 
most  niggard  in  her  gifts.  What  would  you  say  if  a  teacher 
refused  to  help  a  boy  because  the  boy  was  slow  to  learn  ; 
because  he  now  and  then  broke  through  the  rules?  What 
if  the  mother  said  :  "  My  boy  is  a  sickly  dunce,  not  worth 
the  pains  of  rearing.  Let  him  die  !  "  What  if  the  father 
said :  "  He  is  a  born  villain,  to  be  bred  only  for  the  gallows  ; 
what  use  to  toil  or  pray  for  him  !  Let  the  hangman  take 
my  son  !  " 

What  shall  be  done  for  Criminals,  the  backward  children 
of  society,  who  refuse  to  keep  up  with  the  moral  or  legal 
advance  of  mankind  ?  They  are  a  dangerous  class.  There 
are  three  things  which  are  sometimes  confounded  :  there  is 
Error,  an  unintentional  violation  of  a  natural  law.  Some- 
times this  comes  from  abundance  of  life  and  energy ;  some- 
times from  ignorance,  general  or  special  ;  sometimes  from 
heedlessness,  which  is  ignorance  for  the  time.  Next  there 
is  Crime,  the  violation  of  a  human  statute.  Suppose  the 
statute  also  represents  a  law  of  God  —  the  violation  thereof 
may  be  the  result  of  ignorance,  or  of  design,  it  may  come 
from  a  bad  heart.  Then  it  becomes  a  Sin  —  the  wilful  vio- 
lation of  a  known  law  of  God.  There  are  many  errors 
which  are  not  crimes  ;  and  the  best  men  often  commit  them 


'.>|  t  sr.UMON    OK    THE 

innocently,  but  not  without  harm,  violating  laws  of  the  body 
or  the  soul,  which  they  have  not  grown  up  to  understand. 
There  have  been  many  crimes  ;  yes,  conscious  violations  of 
roan's  law  which  were  not  sins,  but  rather  a  keeping  of 
God's  law.  There  are  still  a  great  many  sins  not  forbidden 
by  any  human  statute,  not  considered  as  crimes.  It  is  no 
crime  to  go  and  fight  in  a  wicked  war ;  nay,  it  is  thought 
a  virtue  It  was  a  crime  in  the  heroes  of  the  American 
Revolution  to  demand  the  unalienable  rights  of  man  — 
they  were  "  traitors  "  who  did  it ;  a  crime  in  Jesus  to  sum 
up  the  "  Law  and  the  Prophets,"  in  one  word,  Love  ;  he 
was  reckoned  an  "  infidel,"  guilty  of  blasphemy  against 
Moses  !  Now  to  punish  an  error  as  a  crime,  a  crime  as  a 
sin,  leads  to  confusion  at  the  first,  and  to  rnuch  worse  than 
confusion  in  the  end. 

But  there  are  crimes  which  are  a  violation  of  the  eternal 
principles  of  justice.  It  is  of  such,  and  the  men  who  commit 
them,  that  I  am  now  to  speak.  What  shall  be  done  for  the 
dangerous  classes,  the  criminals  ? 

The  first  question  is,  What  end  shall  we  aim  at  in  dealing 
with  them  ?  The  means  must  be  suited  to  accomplish  that 
end.  We  may  desire  vengeance  ;  then  the  hurt  inflicted  on 
the  criminal  will  be  proportioned  to  the  loss  or  hurt  sustained 
by  society.  A  man  has  stolen  my  goods,  injured  my  person, 
traduced  my  good  name,  sought  to  take  my  life.  I  will  not 
ask  for  the  motive  of  his  deeds,  or  the  cause  of  that  motive. 
I  will  only  consider  my  own  damage,  and  will  make  him 
smart  for  that.  I  will  use  violence  —  having  an  eye  for  an 
eye  and  a  tooth  for  a  tooth.  I  will  deliver  him  over  to  the 
tormentors  till  my  vengeance  is  satisfied.  If  he  slew  my 
friend,  or  sought  to  slay  but  lacked  the  power,  as  I  have  the 
ability  I  will  kill  him  !  This  desire  of  vengeance,  of  paying 
a  hurt  with  a  hurt,  has  still  very  much  influence  on  our 
treatment  of  criminals.  I  fear  it  is  still  the  chief  aim  of  our 
penal  jurisprudence.  When  vengeance  is  the  aim,  violence 
is  the  most  suitable  method  ;  jails  and  the  gallows  most  ap- 


DANGEROl  S    CLASSES    IN     SOCIETY.  215 

propriate  instruments  !  But  is  it  right  to  take  vengeance  ; 
for  me  to  hurt  a  man  to-day  solely  because  he  hurt  me  yes- 
terday ?  If  so,  the  proof  of  that  right  must  be  found  in 
my  nature,  in  the  law  of  God  ;  a  man  can  make  a  statute, 
God  only  a  right.  As  I  study  my  nature,  I  find  no  such 
right ;  reason  gives  me  none  ;  conscience  none ;  religion 
quite  as  little.  Doubtless  I  have  a  right  to  defend  myself 
by  all  manly  means  ;  to  protect  myself  for  the  future  no 
less  than  for  the  present.  In  doing  that,  it  may  be  needful 
that  I  should  restrain,  and  in  restraining  seize  and  hold,  and 
in  holding  incidentally  hurt  my  opponent.  But  I  cannot 
see  what  right  I  have  in  cold  blood  wilfully  to  hurt  a  man 
because  he  once  hurt  me,  and  does  not  intend  to  repeat  the 
wrong.  Do  I  look  to  the  authority  of  the  greatest  Son  of 
man  ?  I  find  no  allusion  to  such  a  right.  I  find  no  law  of 
God  which  allows  vengeance.  In  his  providence  I  find 
justice  everywhere  as  beautiful  as  certain  ;  but  vengeance 
nowhere.  I  know  this  is  not  the  common  notion  entertained 
of  God  and  his  providence.  I  shudder  to  think  at  the  bar- 
barism which  yet  prevails  under  the  guise  of  Christianity ; 
the  vengeance  which  is  sought  for  in  the  name  of  God  ! 

The  aim  may  be  not  to  revenge  a  crime,  but  to  prevent  it; 
to  deter  the  offender  from  repeating  the  deed,  and  others 
from  the  beginning  thereof.  In  all  modern  legislation  the 
vindictive  spirit  is  slowly  yielding  to  the  design  of  prevent- 
ing crime.  The  method  is  to  inflict  certain  uniform  and 
specific  penalties  for  each  offence,  proportionate  to  the 
damage  which  the  criminal  has  done  ;  to  make  the  punish- 
ment so  certain,  so  severe,  or  so  infamous,  that  the  offender 
shall  forbear  for  the  future,  and  innocent  men  be  deterred 
from  crime.  -But  have  we  a  right  to  punish  a  man  for  the 
example's  sake  ?  I  may  give  up  my  life  to  save  a  thousand 
lives,  or  one  if  I  will.  But  society  has  no  right  to  take  it, 
without  my  consent,  to  save  the  whole  human  race  !  I 
admit  that  society  has  the  right  of  eminent  domain  over  my 
property,  and  may  take  my  land  for  a  street ;  may  destroy 


216  SERMON    Of    THE 

my  house  to  save  the  town ;  perhaps  seize  on  my  store  of 
provisions  in  time  of  famine.  It  can  render  me  an  equiva- 
lent for  those  things.  I  have  not  the  same  lien  on  any 
portion  of  the  universe  as  on  my  life,  my  person.  To  these 
I  have  rights  which  none  can  alienate  except  myself,  which 
no  man  has  given,  which  all  men  can  never  justly  take 
away.  For  any  injustice  wilfully  done  to  me,  the  human 
race  can  render  me  no  equivalent. 

I  know  society  claims  the  right  of  eminent  domain  over 
person  and  life  not  less  than  over  house  and  land  —  to  take 
both  for  the  Commonwealth.  I  deny  the  right  —  certainly  it 
has  never  been  shown.  Hence  to  me,  resting  on  the  broad 
ground  of  natural  justice,  the  law  of  God,  capital  punishment 
seems  wholly  inadmissible,  homicide  with  the  pomp  and 
formality  of  law.  It  is  a  relic  of  the  old  barbarism  — 
paying  hurt  for  hurt.  No  one  will  contend  that  it  is  inflicted 
for  the  offender's  good.  For  the  good  of  others  I  contend 
we  have  no  right  to  inflict  it  without  the  sufferer's  consent. 
To  put  a  criminal  to  death  seems  to  me  as  foolish  as  for  the 
child  to  beat  the  stool  it  has  stumbled  over,  and  as  useless 
too.  I  am  astonished  that  nations  with  the  name  of  Christian 
ever  on  their  lips,  continue  to  disgrace  themselves  by  killing 
men,  formally  and  in  cold  blood  ;  to  do  this  with  prayers  — 
"  Forgive  us  as  we  forgive  ; "  doing  it  in  the  name  of  God  ! 
I  do  not  wonder  that  in  the  codes  of  nations,  Hebrew  or 
heathen,  far  lower  than  ourselves  in  civilization,  we  should 
find  laws  enforcing  this  punishment ;  laws  too  enacted  in  the 
name  of  God.  But  it  fills  me  with  amazement  that  worthy 
men  in  these  days  should  go  back  to  such  sources  for  their 
wisdom  ;  should  walk  dry-shod  through  the  Gospels  and  seek 
in  records  of  a  barbarous  people  to  justify  this  atrocious 
act !  Famine,  pestilence,  war  are  terrible  evils,  but  no  one 
is  so  dreadful  in  its  effects  as  the  general  prevalence  of  a 
great  theological  idea  that  is  false. 

It  makes  me  shudder  to  recollect  that  out  of  the  twenty- 
eight  States  of  this  Union  twenty-seven  should  still  continue 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  217 

the  gallows  as  a  part  of  the  furniture  of  a  Christian  Govern- 
ment. I  hope  our  own  State,  dignified  already  by  so  many 
noble  acts,  will  soon  rid  herself  of  the  stain.  Let  us  try  the 
experiment  of  abolishing  this  penalty,  if  we  will  for  twenty 
years,  or  but  ten,  and  I  am  confident  we  shall  never  return 
to  that  punishment.  If  a  man  be  incapable  of  living  in 
society,  so  ill-born  or  ill-bred  that  you  cannot  cure  or  mend 
him,  why,  hide  him  away  out  of  society.  Let  him  do  no 
harm,  but  treat  him  kindly,  not  like  a  wolf  but  a  man. 
Make  him  work,  to  be  useful  to  himself,  to  society,  but  do 
not  kill  him.  Or  if  you  do,  never  say  again,  "  Forgive  us 
our  trespasses  as  we  forgive  those  that  trespass  against  us." 
What  if  He  should  take  you  at  your  word !  What  would 
you  think  of  a  father  who  to-morrow  should  take  the  Old 
Testament  for  his  legal  warrant,  and  bring  his  son  before 
your  Mayor  and  Aldermen  because  he  was  "  stubborn  and 
rebellious,  a  drunkard  and  a  glutton,"  and  they  should  stone 
him  to  death  in  front  of  the  City  Hall !  But  there  is  quite 
as  good  a  warrant  in  the  Old  Testament  for  that  as  for 
hanging  a  man.  The  law  is  referred  to  Jehovah  as  its 
author.  How  much  better  is  it  to  choke  the  life  out  of  a  man 
behind  the  prison  wall  ?  Is  not  society  the  father  of  us 
all,  our  protector  and  defender?  Hanging  is  vengeance  ; 
nothing  but  vengeance.  I  can  readily  conceive  of  that  great 
Son  of  man,  whom  the  loyal  world  so  readily  adores,  per- 
forming all  needful  human  works  with  manly  dignity.  Artists 
once  loved  to  paint  the  Saviour  in  the  lowly  toil  of  lowly 
men,  his  garments  covered  with  the  dust  of  common  life ; 
his  soul  sullied  by  no  pollution.  But  paint  him  to  your  fancy 
as  an  executioner ;  legally  killing  a  man  ;  the  halter  in  his 
hands,  hanging  Judas  for  high  treason  !  You  see  the  relation 
which  that  punishment  bears  to  Christianity.  Yet  what  was 
unchristian  in  Jesus  does  not  become  Christian  in  the  sheriff. 
We  call  ourselves  Christians  ;  we  often  repeat  the  name,  the 
words  of  Christ,  —  but  his  prayer?  oh  no  —  not  that. 

There  are  now  in  this  land  I  think  sixteen  men  under 
19 


218  SERMON    OF    THE 

sentence  of  death ;  sixteen  men  to  be  hanged  till  they  are  dead ! 
Is  there  not  in  the  nation  skill  to  heal  these  men  ?  Perhaps 
it  is  so.  I  have  known  hearts  which  seemed  to  me  cold 
stones,  so  hard,  so  dry.  No  kindly  steel  had  alchemy  to 
win  a  spark  from  them.  Yet  their  owners  went  about  the 
streets  and  smiled  their  hollow  smiles ;  the  ghastly  brother 
cast  his  shadow  in  the  sun,  or  wrapped  his  cloak  about  him 
in  the  wintry  hour,  and  still  the  world  went  on  though  the 
worst  of  men  remained  unhanged.  Perhaps  you  cannot 
cure  these  men !  —  is  there  not  power  enough  to  keep  them 
from  doing  harm  ;  to  make  them  useful  ?  Shame  on  us 
that  we  know  no  better  than  thus  to  pour  out  life  upon  the 
dust,  and  then  with  reeking  hands  turn  to  the  poor  and  weak 
and  say,  "  Ye  shall  not  kill." 

But  if  the  prevention  of  crime  be  the  design  of  the 
punishment,  then  we  must  not  only  seek  to  hinder  the 
innocent  from  vice,  but  we  must  reform  the  criminal.  Do 
our  methods  of  punishment  effect  that  object  ?  During  the 
past  year  we  have  committed  to  the  various  prisons  in 
Massachusetts  five  thousand  six  hundred  sixty-nine  persons 
for  crime.  How  many  of  them  will  be  reformed  and  cured 
by  this  treatment,  and  so  live  honest  and  useful  lives  here- 
after ?  I  think  very  few.  The  facts  show  that  a  great  many 
criminals  are  never  reformed  by  their  punishment.  Thus  in 
France,  taking  the  average  of  four  years,  it  seems  that 
twenty-two  out  of  each  hundred  criminals  were  punished 
oftener  than  once ;  in  Scotland  thirty-six  out  of  the  hundred. 
Of  the  seventy-eight  received  at  your  State's  prison  the  last 
year  —  seventeen  have  been  sent  to  that  very  prison  before. 
How  many  of  them  have  been  tenants  of  other  institutions  I 
know  not,  but  as  only  twenty-three  of  the  seventy-eight  are 
natives  of  this  State,  it  is  plain  that  many,  under  other  names, 
may  have  been  confined  in  jail  before.  Yet  of  these  seventy- 
eight,  ten  are  less  than  twenty  years  old.*  Of  thirty-five 

*  See  other  statistics  in  "  Sermon  of  the  Perishing  Classes,"  pp. 
147,  148. 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  219 

men  sent  from  Boston  to  the  State's  prison  in  one  year,  four- 
teen had  been  there  before.  More  than  half  the  inmates  of 
the  House  of  Correction  in  this  city  are  punished  oftener 
than  once  !  These  facts  show  that  if  we  aim  at  the  refor- 
mation of  the  offender  we  fail  most  signally.  Yet  every 
criminal  not  reformed  lives  mainly  at  the  charge  of  society ; 
and  lives  too  in  the  most  costly  way,  for  the  articles  he  steals 
have  seldom  the  same  value  to  him  as  to  the  lawful  owner. 

It  seems  to  me  that  our  whole  method  of  punishing  crimes 
is  a  false  one  ;  that  but  little  good  comes  of  it,  or  can  come. 
We  beat  the  stool  which  we  have  stumbled  over.  We 
punish  a  man  in  proportion  to  the  loss  or  the  fear  of  society ; 
not  in  proportion  to  the  offender's  state  of  mind ;  not  with 
a  careful  desire  to  improve  that  state  of  mind.  This  is  wise 
if  vengeance  be  the  aim ;  if  reformation,  it  seems  sheer 
folly.  I  know  our  present  method  is  the  result  of  six  thou- 
sand years'  experience  of  mankind  ;  I  know  how  easy  it  is  to 
find  fault  —  how  difficult  to  devise  a  better  mode.  Still  the 
facts  are  so  plain  that  one  with  half  an  eye  cannot  fail  to  see 
the  falseness  of  the  present  methods.  To  remove  the  evil, 
we  must  remove  its  cause, — so  let  us  look  a  little  into  this 
matter,  and  see  from  what  quarter  our  criminals  proceed. 

Here  are  two  classes. 

I.  There  are  the  foes  of  society  ;  men  that  are  criminals  in 
soul,  born  criminals,  who  have  a  bad  nature.     The  cause  of 
their  crime  therefore  is  to  be  found  in  their  nature  itself,  in 
their  organization  if  you  will.     All  experience  shows  that 
some  men  are  born  with  a  depraved  organization,  an  excess 
of  animal  passions,  or  a  deficiency  of  other  powers  to  balance 
them. 

II.  There  are  the  victims  of  society ;   men  that  become 
criminals  by  circumstances,  made  criminals,  not  born  ;  men 
who  become  criminals,  not  so  much  from  strength  of  evil  in 
their  soul,  or  excess  of  evil  propensities  in  their  organization, 
as  from  strength  of  evil  in  their  circumstances.    I  do  not  say 
that  a  man's  character  is  wholly  determined  by  the  circum- 
stances in  which  he  is  placed,  but  all  experience  shows  that 


220  SERMON    OF    THE 

circumstances,  such  as  exposure  in  youth  to  good  men  or 
bad  men,  education,  intellectual,  moral,  and  religious,  or 
neglect  thereof  entire  or  partial,  have  a  vast  influence  in 
forming  the  character  of  men,  especially  of  men  not  well 
endowed  by  nature. 

Now  the  criminals  in  soul  are  the  most  dangerous  of  men, 
the  born  foes  of  society.  I  will  not  at  this  moment  undertake 
to  go  behind  their  organization  and  ask,  "  How  comes  it 
that  they  are  so  ill-born  ?  "  I  stop  now  at  that  fact.  The 
cause  of  their  crime  is  in  their  bodily  constitution  itself. 
This  is  always  a  small  class.  There  are  in  New  England 
perhaps  five  hundred  men  born  blind  or  deaf.  Apart  from 
the  idiots,  I  think  there  are  not  half  so  many  who  by  nature 
and  bodily  constitution  are  incapable  of  attaining  the  average 
morality  of  the  race  at  this  day  ;  not  so  many  born  foes  of 
society  as  are  born  blind  or  deaf. 

The  criminals  from  circumstances  become  what  they  are 
by  the  action  of  causes  which  may  be  ascertained,  guarded 
against,  mitigated,  and  at  last  overcome  and  removed. 
These  men  are  born  of  poor  parents,  and  find  it  difficult  to 
satisfy  the  natural  wants  of  food,  clothing,  and  shelter. 
They  get  little  culture,  intellectual  or  moral.  The  school- 
house  is  open,  but  the  parent  does  not  send  the  children,  he 
wants  their  services,  to  beg  for  him,  perhaps  to  steal,  it  may 
be  to  do  little  services  which  lie  within  their  power.  Besides, 
the  child  must  be  ill-clad,  and  so  a  mark  is  set  on  him.  The 
boy  of  the  perishing  classes,  with  but  common  endowments, 
cannot  learn  at  school  as  one  of  the  thrifty  or  abounding 
class.  Then  he  receives  no  stimulus  at  home  ;  there  every- 
thing discourages  his  attempts.  He  cannot  share  the 
pleasure  and  sport  of  his  youthful  fellows.  His  dress,  his 
uncleanly  habits,  the  result  of  misery,  forbid  all  that.  So 
the  children  of  the  perishing  herd  together,  ignorant,  ill-fed, 
and  miserably  clad.  You  do  not  find  the  sons  of  this  class 
in  your  colleges,  in  your  high  schools  where  all  is  free  for 
the  people ;  few  even  in  the  grammer  schools ;  few  in  the 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  221 

churches.     Though  born  into  the  nineteenth  century  after 
Christ,  they  grow  up  almost  in  the  barbarism  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  before  him.    Children  that  are  blind  and  deaf, 
though  born  with  a  superior  organization,  if  left  to  themselves 
become  only  savages,  little  more  than  animals.     What  are 
we  to  expect  of  children,  born  indeed  with  eyes  and  ears,  but 
yet  shut  out  from  the  culture  of  the  age  they  live  in  ?     In 
the  corruption  of  a  city,  in  the  midst  of  its  intenser  life,  what 
wonder  that  they  associate  with  crime,  that  the  moral  instinct, 
baffled  and  cheated  of  its  due,  becomes  so  powerless  in  the  boy 
or  girl ;  what  wonder  that  reason  never  gets  developed  there, 
nor  conscience  nor  that  blessed  religious  sense  learns  ever 
to  assert  its  power  ?    Think  of  the  temptations  that  beset  the 
boy  ;  those  yet  more  revolting  which  address  the  other  sex. 
Opportunities  for  crime    continually  offer.     Want    impels, 
desire  leagues  with  opportunity,  and  the  result  we  know. 
Add  to  all  this  the  curse    that  creates  so  much  disease, 
poverty,  wretchedness  and  so  perpetually  begets  crime  ;  I 
mean  intemperance  !     That  is  almost  the  only  pleasure  of 
the  perishing  class.   What  recognized  amusement  have  they 
but  this,  of  drinking  themselves  drunk  ?     Do  you  wonder  at 
this  ?    with  no  air,  nor  light,  nor  water,  with  scanty  food  and 
a  miserable  dress,  with  no  culture,  living  in  a  cellar  or  a 
garret,  crowded,  stifling,  and  offensive  even  to  the  rudest 
sense,  do  you  wonder  that  man  or  woman  seeks  a  brief 
vacation  of  misery  in  the  dram-shop  and  in  its  drunkenness? 
I  wonder  not.    Under  such  circumstances  how  many  of  you 
would  have  done  better  ?     To  suffer  continually  from  lack 
of  what  is  needful  for  the  natural  bodily  wants  of  food,  of 
shelter,  of  warmth,  that  suffering  is  misery.     It  is  not  too 
much   to  say,  there    are   always   in  this  city  thousands  of 
persons  who  smart  under  that  misery.     They  are  indeed  a 
perishing  class. 

Almost  all   our  criminals,  victims  and  foes,  come  from 
this  portion  of  society.     Most  of  those  born  with  an  organ- 
ization that  is  predisposed  to  crime  are  born  there.     The 
19* 


222  SERMON    OF    THE 

laws  of  nature  are  unavoidably  violated  from  generation  to 
generation.  Unnatural  results  must  follow.  The  misfor- 
tunes of  the  father  are  visited  on  his  miserable  child.  Cows 
and  sheep  degenerate  when  the  demands  of  nature  are  not 
met,  and  men  degenerate  not  less.  Only  the  low,  animal 
instincts,  those  of  self-defence  and  self-perpetuation  get 
developed  ;  these  with  preternatural  force.  The  animal 
man  wakes,  becomes  brutish,  while  the  spiritual  element 
sleeps  within  him.  Unavoidably  then  the  perishing  is 
mother  of  the  dangerous  class. 

I  deny  not  that  a  portion  of  criminals  come  from  other 
sources,  but  at  least  nine  tenths  thereof  proceed  from  this 
quarter.  Of  two  hundred  and  seventy-three  thousand,  eight 
hundred  and  eighteen  criminals  punished  in  France  from  1825 
to  1839,  more  than  half  were  wholly  unable  even  to  read,  and 
had  been  brought  up  subject  to  no  family  affections.  Out  of 
seventy  criminals  in  one  prison  at  Glasgow  who  were  under 
eighteen,  fifty  were  orphans  having  lost  one  or  both  parents, 
and  nearly  all  the  rest  had  parents  of  bad  character  and 
reputation.  Taking  all  the  criminals  in  England  and  Wales 
in  1841,  there  were  not  eight  in  a  hundred  that  could  read 
and  write  well.  In  our  country,  where  everybody  gets  a 
mouthful  of  education,  though  scarce  any  one  a  full  meal, 
the  result  is  a  little  different.  Thus  of  the  seven  hundred 
and  ninety  prisoners  in  the  Mount  Pleasant  State's  Prison 
in  New  York,  one  hundred  it  is  said  could  read  and  under- 
stand. Yet  of  all  our  criminals  only  a  very  small  proportion 
have  been  in  a  condition  to  obtain  the  average  intellectual 
and  moral  culture  of  our  times. 

Our  present  mode  of  treating  criminals  does  no  good  to 
this  class  of  men,  these  victims  of  circumstances.  I  do  not 
know  that  their  improvement  is  even  contemplated.  We 
do  not  ask  what  causes  made  this  man  a  criminal,  and  then 
set  ourselves  to  remove  those  causes.  We  look  only  at  the 
crime  ;  so  we  punish  practically  a  man  because  he  had  a 
wicked  father;  because  his  education  was  neglected,  and 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  223 

he  exposed  to  the  baneful  influence  of  unholy  men.  In 
the  main  we  treat  all  criminals  alike  if  guilty  of  the  same 
offence,  though  the  same  act  denotes  very  different  degrees 
of  culpability  in  the  different  men,  and  the  same  punishment 
is  attended  with  quite  opposite  results.  Two  men  commit 
similar  crimes,  we  sentence  them  both  to  the  State  Prison 
for  ten  years.  At  the  expiration  of  one  year  let  us  suppose 
one  man  has  thoroughly  reformed,  and  has  made  strict  and 
solemn  resolutions  to  pursue  an  honest  and  useful  life.  I 
do  not  say  such  a  result  is  to  be  expected  from  such  treat- 
ment ;  still  it  is  possible,  and  I  think  has  happened,  perhaps 
many  times.  We  do  not  discharge  the  man ;  we  care 
nothing  for  his  penitence ;  nothing  for  his  improvement ; 
we  keep  him  nine  years  more.  That  is  an  injustice  to 
him  ;  we  have  robbed  him  of  nine  years  of  time  which  he 
might  have  converted  into  life.  It  is  unjust  also  to  society, 
which  needs  the  presence  and  the  labor  of  all  that  can 
serve.  The  man  has  been  a  burthen  to  himself  and  to  us. 
Suppose  at  the  expiration  of  his  ten  years  the  other  man  is 
not  reformed  at  all ;  this  result,  I  fear,  happens  in  the  great 
majority  of  cases.  He  is  no  better  for  what  he  has  suffered  ; 
we  know  that  he  will  return  to  his  career  of  crime,  with 
new  energy  and  with  even  malice.  Still  he  is  discharged. 
This  is  unjust  to  him,  for  he  cannot  bear  the  fresh  exposure 
to  circumstances  which  corrupted  him  at  first,  and  he  will 
fall  lower  still.  It  is  unjust  to  society,  for  the  property  and 
the  persons  of  all  are  exposed  to  his  passions  just  as  much 
as  before.  He  feels  indignant  as  if  he  had  suffered  a 
wrong.  He  says,  "  Society  has  taken  vengeance  on  me, 
when  I  was  to  be  pitied  more  than  blamed.  Now  I  will 
have  my  turn.  They  will  not  allow  me  to  live  by  honest 
toil.  I  will  learn  their  lesson.  I  will  plunder  their  wealth, 
their  roof  shall  blaze  ! "  He  will  live  at  the  expense  of 
society,  and  in  the  way  least  profitable  and  most  costly  to 
mankind.  This  idle  savage  will  levy  destructive  contribu- 
tions on  the  rich,  the  thrifty,  and  the  industrious.  Yes,  he 


224  SERMON    OF    THE 

will  help  teach  others  the  wickedness  which  himself  once, 
and  perhaps  unavoidably  learned.  So  in  the  very  bosom  of 
society  there  is  a  horde  of  marauders  waging  perpetual  war 
against  mankind. 

Do  not  say  my  sympathies  are  with  the  wicked,  not  the 
industrious  and  good.  It  is  not  so.  My  sympathies  are  not 
confined  to  one  class,  honorable  or  despised.  But  it  seems 
to  me  this  whole  method  of  keeping  a  criminal  a  definite 
time  and  then  discharging  him,  whether  made  better  or 
worse,  is  a  mistake.  Certainly  it  is  so  if  we  aim  at  his 
reformation.  What  if  a  shepherd  made  it  a  rule  to  look 
one  hour  for  each  lost  sheep,  and  then  return  with  or  with- 
out the  wanderer  ?  What  if  a  smith  decreed  that  one  hour 
and  no  more  should  be  spent  in  shoeing  a  horse,  and  so 
worked  that  time  on  each,  though  half  that  time  were  enough 
—  or  sent  home  the  beast  with  but  three  shoes,  or  two,  or 
one,  because  the  hour  passed  by  ?  What  if  the  physicians 
decreed,  that  all  men  sick  of  some  contagious  disease,  should 
spend  six  weeks  in  the  hospital,  then,  if  the  patient  were 
found  well  the  next  day  after  admission,  still  kept  him  the 
other  forty  ;  or,  if  not  mended  at  the  last  day,  sent  him  out 
sick  to  the  world  ?  Such  a  course  would  be  less  unjust,  less 
inhuman,  only  the  wrong  is  more  obvious. 

To  aggravate  the  matter  still  more,  we  have  made  the 
punishment  more  infamous  than  the  crime.  A  man  may 
commit  great  crimes  which  indicate  deep  depravity ;  may 
escape  the  legal  punishment  thereof  by  gold,  by  flight,  by 
further  crimes,  and  yet  hold  up  his  head  unblushing  and 
unrepentant  amongst  mankind.  Let  him  commit  a  small 
crime,  which  shall  involve  no  moral  guilt,  and  be  legally 
punished  —  who  respects  him  again  ?  What  years  of  noble 
life  are  deemed  enough  to  wipe  the  stain  out  of  his  repu- 
tation ?  Nay,  his  children  after  him,  to  the  third  genera- 
tion, must  bear  the  curse  ! 

The  evil  does  not  stop  with  the  infamy.  A  guilty  man 
has  served  out  his  time.  He  is  thoroughly  resolved  on 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  225 

industry  and  a  moral  life.  Perhaps  he  has  not  learned  that 
crime  is  wrong,  but  found  it  unprofitable.  He  will  live 
away  from  the  circumstances  which  before  led  him  to  crime. 
He  comes  out  of  prison,  and  the  jail-mark  is  on  him.  He 
now  suffers  the  severest  part  of  his  punishment.  Friends 
and  relations  shun  him.  He  is  doomed  and  solitary  in  the 
midst  of  the  crowd.  Honest  men  will  seldom  employ  him. 
The  thriving  class  look  on  him  with  shuddering  pity  ;  the 
abounding  loathe  the  convict's  touch.  He  is  driven  among  the 
dangerous  and  the  perishing  ;  they  open  their  arms  and  offer 
him  their  destructive  sympathy.  They  minister  to  his  wants ; 
they  exaggerate  his  wrongs ;  they  nourish  his  indignation. 
His  direction  is  no  longer  in  his  own  hands.  His  good  reso- 
lutions—  he  knows  they  were  good,  but  only  impossible. 
He  looks  back,  and  sees  nothing  but  crime  and  the  ven- 
geance society  takes  for  the  crime.  He  looks  around,  and 
the  world  seems  thrusting  at  him  from  all  quarters.  He 
looks  forward,  and  what  prospect  is  there  ?  "  Hope  never 
comes  lhat  comes  to  all."  He  must  plunge  afresh  into 
that  miry  pit,  which  at  last  is  sure  to  swallow  him  up.  He 
plunges  anew,  and  the  jail  awaits  him  ;  again  ;  deeper  yet ; 
the  gallows  alone  can  swing  him  clear  from  that  pestilent 
ditch.  But  he  is  a  man  and  a  brother,  our  companion  in 
weakness.  With  his  education,  exposure,  temptation,  out- 
ward and  from  within,  how  much  better  would  the  best  of 
you  become  ? 

No  better  result  is  to  be  looked  for  from  such  a  course. 
Of  the  one  thousand  five  hundred  and  ninety-two  persons 
in  the  State's  prison  of  New  York,  four  hundred  have  been 
there  more  than  once.  In  five  years,  from  1841  to  1847, 
there  were  punished  in  the  House  of  Correction  in  this  city, 
five  thousand  seven  hundred  and  forty-eight  persons  ;  of  these 
three  thousand  one  hundred  and  forty-six  received  such  a  sen- 
tence qftener  than  once.  Yes,  in  five  years  three  hundred  and 
thirteen  were  sent  thither,  each  ten  times  or  more !  How 
many  found  a  place  in  other  jails  I  know  not. 


226  SERMON    OK    THE 

What  if  fathers  treated  dull  or  vicious  boys  in  this  man- 
ner at  home —  making  them  infamous  for  the  first  ofFe nee, 
or  the  first  dullness,  and  then  refusing  to  receive  them  back 
again  ?  What  if  the  father  sent  out  his  son  with  bad  boys, 
and  when  he  erred  and  fell  said  :  "  You  did  mischief  with 
bad  boys  once  ;  I  know  they  enticed  you.  I  knew  you 
were  feeble  and  could  not  resist  their  seductions.  But  I 
shall  punish  you.  Do  as  well  as  you  please,  I  will  not 
forgive  you.  If  you  err  again,  I  will  punish  you  afresh. 
If  you  do  never  so  well,  you  shall  be  infamous  for  ever ! " 
What  if  a  public  teacher  never  took  back  to  college  a  boy 
who  once  had  broke  the  academic  law  —  but  made  him 
infamous  for  ever  ?  What  if  the  physicians  had  kept  a 
patient  the  requisite  time  in  the  hospital,  and  discharged 
him  as  wholly  cured,  but  bid  men  beware  of  him  and  shun 
him  for  ever  ?  That  is  just  what  we  are  doing  with  this 
class  of  criminals;  not  intentionally,  not  consciously  —  but 
doing  none  the  less  ! 

Let  us  look  a  moment  more  carefully,  though  I  have  al- 
ready touched  on  this  subject,  at  the  proximate  causes  of  crime 
in  this  class  of  men.  The  first  cause  is  obvious  —  poverty. 
Most  of  the  criminals  are  from  the  lowest  ranks  of  society. 
If  you  distribute  men  into  three  classes,  the  abounding, 
the  thriving,  the  perishing,  you  will  find  the  inmates  of  your 
prisons  come  almost  wholly  from  the  latter  class.  The 
perishing  fill  the  sink  of  society,  and  the  dangerous  the  sink 
of  the  perishing  —  for  in  that  "  lowest  deep  there  is  a  lower 
depth."  Of  three  thousand  one  hundred  and  eighty-eight 
persons  confined  in  the  House  of  Correction  in  this  city, 
one  thousand  six  hundred  and  fifty-seven  were  foreigners ; 
of  the  five  hundred  and  fifty  sent  from  this  city  in  five 
years  to  the  State's  Prison,  one  hundred  and  eighty-five 
were  foreigners.  Of  five  hundred  and  forty-seven  females 
in  the  Prison  on  Blackwell's  Island  at  one  time  —  five  hun- 
dred and  nineteen  were  committed  for  "  vagrancy  ; "  women 
with  no  capital  but  their  person,  with  no  friend,  no  shelter. 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  227 

Examine  minutely,  you  shall  find  that  more  than  nine 
tenths  of  all  criminals  come  from  the  perishing  class  of 
men.  There  all  cultivation,  intellectual,  moral,  religious, 
is  at  the  lowest  ebb.  They  are  a  class  of  barbarians ; 
yes,  of  savages,  living  in  the  midst  of  civilization,  but  not 
of  it.  The  fact,  that  most  criminals  come  from  this  class, 
shows  that  the  causes  of  the  crime  lie  out  of  them  more 
than  in  them  ;  that  they  are  victims  of  society,  not  foes. 
The  effect  of  property  in  elevating  and  moralizing  a  class 
of  men  is  seldom  appreciated.  Historically  the  animal  man 
comes  before  the  spiritual.  Animal  wants  are  imperious ; 
they  must  be  supplied.  The  lower  you  go  in  the  social 
scale,  the  more  is  man  subordinated  to  his  animal  appetites 
and  demonized  by  them.  Nature  aims  to  preserve  the 
individual  and  repeat  the  species  —  so  all  passions  relative 
to  these  two  designs  are  preeminently  powerful.  If  a  man 
is  born  into  the  intense  life  of  an  American  city,  and  grows 
up,  having  no  contact  with  the  loftier  culture  which  natu- 
rally belongs  to  that  intense  life,  why  the  man  becomes 
mainly  an  animal,  all  the  more  violent  for  the  atmosphere 
he  breathes  in.  What  shall  restrain  him  ?  He  has  not  the 
normal  check  of  reason,  conscience,  religion,  these  sleep 
in  the  man ;  nor  the  artificial  and  conventional  check  of 
honor,  of  manners.  The  public  opinion  which  he  bows  to 
favors  obscenity,  drunkenness,  and  violence.  He  is  doubly 
a  savage.  His  wants  cannot  be  legally  satisfied.  He 
breaks  the  law,  the  law  which  covers  property,  then  goes 
on  to  higher  crimes. 

The  next  cause  is  the  result  of  the  first  —  education  is 
neglected,  intellectual,  moral,  and  religious.  Now  and  then  a 
boy  in  whom  the  soul  of  genius  is  covered  with  the  beggar's 
rags,  struggles  through  the  terrible  environment  of  modern 
poverty  to  die,  the  hero  of  misery,  in  the  attempt  at  educa- 
tion !  His  expiring  light  only  makes  visible  the  darkness 
out  of  which  it  shone.  Boys  born  into  this  condition  find 
at  home  nothing  to  aid  them,  nothing  to  encourage  a  love 


228  SERMON    OF    THE 

of  excellence,  or  a  taste  for  even  the  rudiments  of  learning. 
What  is  unavoidably  the  lot  of  such  ?  The  land  has  been 
the  schoolmaster  of  the  human  race  —  but  the  perishing 
class  scarce  sees  its  face.  Poverty  brings  privations,  misery, 
and  that  a  deranged  state  of  the  system ;  then  unnatural 
appetites  goad  and  burn  the  man.  The  destruction  of  the 
poor  is  their  poverty.  They  see  wealth  about  them,  but 
have  none ;  so  none  of  what  it  brings  ;  neither  the  clean- 
liness, nor  health,  nor  self-respect,  nor  cultivation  of  mind, 
and  heart,  and  soul.  I  am  told  that  no  Quaker  has  ever 
been  confined  in  any  jail  in  New  England  for  any  real 
crime.  Are  the  Quakers  better  born  than  other  men  ? 
Nay,  but  they  are  looked  after  in  childhood.  Who  ever 
saw  a  Quaker  in  an  almshouse  ?  Not  a  fiftieth  part  of  the 
people  of  New  York  are  negroes,  yet  more  than  a  sixth 
part  of  all  the  criminals  in  her  four  State's  Prisons  are  men 
of  color.  These  facts  show  plainly  the  causes  of  crime. 

It  is  almost  impossible  to  exaggerate  the  temptations  of 
the  perishing  class  in  our  great  cities.  In  Boston  at  this 
moment  there  are  more  than  four  hundred  boys  employed 
about  the  various  bowling-alleys  of  the  city,  exposed  to  the 
intemperance,  the  coarseness,  the  general  corruption  of  the 
men  who  mainly  frequent  those  places.  What  will  be  their 
fate  ?  Shall  I  speak  of  their  sisters  ;  of  the  education  they 
are  receiving ;  the  end  that  awaits  them  ?  Poverty  brings 
misery  with  its  family  of  vices. 

A  third  cause  of  crime  comes  with  the  rest  —  intem- 
perance, the  destroying  angel  that  lays  waste  the  household 
of  the  poor.  In  our  country,  misery  in  a  healthy  man  is 
almost  proof  of  vice  ;  but  the  vice  may  belong  to  one  alone, 
and  the  misery  it  brings  be  shared  by  the  whole  family. 
A  large  proportion  of  the  perishing  class  are  intemperate, 
and  a  great  majority  of  all  our  criminals. 

Now,  our  present  method  is  wholly  inadequate  to  reform 
men  exposed  to  such  circumstances.  You  may  punish  the 
man,  but  it  does  no  good.  You  can  seldom  frighten  men 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  229 

out  of  a  fever.  Can  you  frighten  them  from  crime,  when 
they  know  little  of  the  internal  distinction  between  right  and 
wrong  ;  when  all  the  circumstances  about  them  impel  to 
crime  ?  Can  you  frighten  a  starving  girl  into  chastity  ? 
You  cannot  keep  men  from  lewdness,  theft  and  violence, 
when  they  have  no  self-respect,  no  culture,  no  development 
of  mind,  heart,  and  soul.  The  jail  will  not  take  the  place 
of  the  church,  of  the  school-house,  of  home.  It  will  not 
remove  the  causes  which  are  making  new  criminals.  It 
does  not  reform  the  old  ones.  Shall  we  shut  men  in  a  jail, 
and  when  there  treat  them  with  all  manner  of  violence, 
crush  out  the  little  self-respect  yet  left,  give  them  a  degrad- 
ing dress,  and  send  them  into  the  world  cursed  with  an 
infamous  name,  and  all  that  because  they  were  born  in  the 
low  places  of  society  and  caught  the  stain  thereof?  The 
jail  does  not  alter  the  circumstances  which  occasioned  the 
crime,  and  till  these  causes  are  removed  a  fresh  crop  will 
spring  out  of  the  festering  soil.  Some  men  teach  dogs  and 
horses  things  unnatural  to  these  animals  ;  they  use  violence 
and  blows  as  their  instrument  of  instruction.  But  to  teach 
man  what  is  conformable  to  his  nature,  something  more  is 
required. 

To  return  to  the  other  class,  who  are  born  criminals. 
Bare  confinement  in  the  prison  alters  no  man's  constitutional 
tendencies ;  it  can  no  more  correct  moral  or  mental  weak- 
ness or  obliquity  than  it  can  correct  a  deficiency  of  the  or- 
gans of  sensation.  You  all  know  the  former  treatment  of 
men  born  with  defective  or  deranged  intellectual  faculties  — 
of  madmen  and  fools.  We  still  pursue  the  same  course 
towards  men  born  with  defective  or  deranged  moral  facul- 
ties, idiots  and  madmen  of  a  more  melancholy  class,  and 
with  a  like  result. 

I  know  how  easy  it   is  to   find  fault,  and   how  difficult  to 

propose  a  better  way  ;  how  easy  to  misunderstand  all  that  I 

have  said,  how  easy  to  misrepresent  it  all.     But  it  seems  to 

me  that  hitherto  we  have  set  out  wrong  in  this  undertaking ; 

20 


230  SERMON    OF    THE 

have  gone  on  wrong,  and,  by  the  present  means,  can  never 
remove  the  causes  of  crime  nor  much  improve  the  criminals 
as  a  class.  Let  me  modestly  set  down  my  thoughts  on  this 
subject,  in  hopes  that  other  men,  wiser  and  more  practical, 
will  find  out  a  way  yet  better  still.  A  jail,  as  a  mere 
house  of  punishment  for  offenders,  ought  to  have  no  place 
in  an  enlightened  people.  It  ought  to  be  a  moral  hospital 
where  the  offender  is  kept  till  he  is  cured.  That  his  crime 
is  great  or  little,  is  comparatively  of  but  small  concern.  It 
is  wrong  to  detain  a  man  against  his  will  after  he  is  cured  ; 
wrong  to  send  him  out  before  he  is  cured,  for  he  will  rob 
and  corrupt  society,  and  at  last  miserably  perish.  We  shall 
find  curable  cases  and  incurable. 

I  would  treat  the  small  class  of  born  criminals,  the  foes 
of  society,  as  maniacs.  I  would  not  kill  them  more  than 
madmen ;  I  would  not  inflict  needless  pain  on  them.  I 
would  not  try  to  shame,  to  whip,  or  to  starve  into  virtue 
men  morally  insane.  I  would  not  torture  a  man  because 
born  with  a  defective  organization.  Since  he  could  not  live 
amongst  men,  I  would  shut  him  out  from  society  ;  would 
make  him  work  for  his  own  good  and  the  good  of  society. 
The  thought  of  punishment  for  its  own  sake,  or  as  a  com- 
pensation for  the  evil  which  a  man  has  done,  I  would  not 
harbor  for  a  moment.  If  a  man  has  done  me  a  wrong, 
calumniated,  insulted,  abused  me  with  all  his  power,  it  ren- 
ders the  matter  no  better  that  I  turn  round  and  make  him 
smart  for  it.  If  he  has  burned  my  house  over  my  head, 
and  I  kill  him  in  return,  it  does  not  rebuild  my  house.  I 
cannot  leave  him  at  large  to  burn  other  men's  houses.  He 
must  be  restrained.  But  if  I  cure  the  man  perhaps  he  will 
rebuild  it,  at  any  rate,  will  be  of  some  service  to  the  world, 
and  others  gain  much  while  I  lose  nothing. 

When  the  victims  of  society  violated  its  laws,  I  would 
not  torture  a  man  for  his  misfortune,  because  his  father  was 
poor,  his  mother  a  brute ;  because  his  education  was  neg- 
lected. I  would  shut  him  out  from  society  for  a  time.  I 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  231 

would  make  him  work  for  his  own  good  and  the  good* of 
others.  The  evil  he  had  caught  from  the  world  I  would 
overcome  by  the  good  that  I  would  present  to  him.  I  would 
not  clothe  him  with  an  infamous  dress,  crowd  him  with 
other  men  whom  society  had  made  infamous,  leaving 
them  to  ferment  and  rot  together.  I  would  not  set  him 
up  as  a  show  to  the  public,  for  his  enemy,  or  his  rival, 
or  some  miserable  fop  to  come  and  stare  at  with  merci- 
less and  tormenting  eye.  I  would  not  load  him  with  chains, 
nor  tear  his  flesh  with  a  whip.  I  would  not  set  soldiers 
with  loaded  gun  to  keep  watch  over  him,  insulting  their 
brother  by  mocking  and  threats.  I  would  treat  the  man 
with  firmness,  but  with  justice,  with  pity,  with  love.  I 
would  teach  the  man  ;  what  his  family  could  not  do  for  him, 
what  society  and  the  church  had  failed  of,  the  jail  should 
do,  for  the  jail  should  be  a  manual  labor  school,  not  a  dun- 
geon of  torture.  I  would  take  the  most  gifted,  the  most 
cultivated,  the  wisest  and  most  benevolent,  yes,  the  most 
Christian  man  in  the  State,  and  set  him  to  train  up  these 
poor  savages  of  civilization.  The  best  man  is  the  natural 
physician  of  the  wicked.  A  violent  man,  angry,  cruel, 
remorseless,  should  never  enter  the  jail  except  as  a  crimi- 
nal. You  have  already  taken  one  of  the  greatest,  wisest, 
and  best  men  of  this  Commonwealth,  and  set  him  to  watch 
over  the  public  education  of  the  people.*  True,  you  give 
him  little  money,  and  no  honor  ;  he  brings  the  honor  to  you, 
not  asking  but  giving  that.  You  begin  to  see  the  result  of 
setting  such  a  man  to  such  a  work,  though  unhonored  and 
ill  paid.  Soon  you  will  see  it  more  plainly  in  the  increase 
of  temperance,  industry,  thrift,  of  good  morals  and  sound 
religion !  I  would  set  such  a  man,  if  I  could  find  such 
another,  to  look  after  the  dangerous  classes  of  society.  I 
would  pay  him  for  it ;  honor  him  for  it.  I  would  have  a 
Board  of  Public  Morals  to  look  after  this  matter  of  crime,  a 
Secretary  of  Public  Morals,  a  Christian  Censor,  whose  busi- 

*  Mr.  Horace  Maim. 


232  SERMON    OF    THE 

ness  it  should  be  to  attend  to  this  class,  to  look  after  the 
jails  and  make  them  houses  of  refuge,  of  instruction,  which 
should  do  for  the  perishing  class  what  the  school-house  and 
the  church  do  for  others.  I  would  send  missionaries  amongst 
the  most  exposed  portions  of  mankind  as  well  as  amongst 
the  savages  of  New  Holland.  I  would  send  wise  men,  good 
men.  There  are  already  some  such  engaged  in  this  work. 
I  would  strengthen  their  hands.  I  would  make  crime  in- 
famous. If  there  are  men  whose  crime  is  to  be  traced  not 
to  a  defective  organization  of  body,  not  to  the  influence  of 
circumstances,  but  only  to  voluntary  and  self-conscious 
wickedness,  —  I  would  make  these  men  infamous.  It  should 
be  impossible  for  such  a  man,  a  voluntary  foe  of  mankind, 
to  live  in  society.  I  would  have  the  jail  such  a  place  that 
the  friends  of  a  criminal  of  either  class  should  take  him  as 
now  they  take  a  lunatic  or  a  sick  man,  and  bring  him  to  the 
Court  that  he  might  be  healed  if  curable,  or  if  not  might  be 
kept  from  harm  and  hid  away  out  of  sight.  Crime  and  sin 
should  be  infamous  ;  not  its  correction,  least  of  all  its  cure. 
I  would  not  loathe  and  abhor  a  man  who  had  been  corrected 
and  reformed  by  the  jail  more  than  a  boy  who  had  been 
reformed  by  his  teacher,  or  a  man  cured  of  lunacy.  I 
would  have  society  a  father  who  goes  out  to  meet  the  prodi- 
gal while  yet  a  great  way  off;  yes,  goes  and  brings  him 
away  from  his  riotous  living,  washes  him,  clothes  him,  and 
restores  him  to  a  right  mind.  There  is  a  prosecuting  attor- 
ney for  the  State  ;  I  would  have  also  a  defending  attorney 
for  the  accused,  that  justice  might  be  done  all  round.  Is 
the  State  only  a  step-mother  ?  Then  is  she  not  a  Christian 
Commonwealth  but  a  barbarous  despotism,  fitly  represented 
by  that  uplifted  sword  on  her  public  seal,  and  that  motto  of 
barbarous  and  bloody  Latin.  I  would  have  the  State  aid 
men  and  direct  them  after  they  have  been  discharged  from 
the  jail,  not  leave  them  to  perish  ;  not  force  them  to  perish. 
Society  is  the  natural  guardian  of  the  weak. 

I  cannot  think  the  method  here  suggested  would  be  so 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  233 

costly  as  the  present.  It  seems  to  me  that  institutions  of 
this  character  might  be  made  not  only  to  support  themselves, 
but  be  so  managed  as  to  leave  a  balance  of  income  consid- 
erably beyond  the  expense.  This  might  be  made  use  of  for 
the  advantage  of  the  criminal  when  he  returned  to  society  ; 
or  with  it  he  might  help  make  restitution  of  what  he  had 
once  stolen.  Besides  being  less  costly,  it  would  cure  the 
offender  and  send  back  valuable  men  into  society. 

It  seems  to  me  that  our  whole  criminal  legislation  is  based 
on  a  false  principle  —  force  and  not  love;  that  it  is  emi- 
nently well  adapted  to  revenge,  not  at  all  to  correct,  to  teach, 
to  cure.  The  whole  apparatus  for  the  punishment  of  offend- 
ers, from  the  gallows  down  to  the  House  of  Correction, 
seems  to  me  wrong  ;  wholly  wrong,  unchristian,  and  even 
inhuman.  We  teach  crime  while  we  punish  it.  Is  it  con- 
sistent for  the  State  to  take  vengeance  when  I  may  not  ?  Is 
it  better  for  the  State  to  kill  a  man  in  cold  blood,  than  for 
me  to  kill  my  brother  when  in  a  rage  ?  I  cannot  help  think- 
ing that  the  gallows  and  even  the  jail,  as  now  administered, 
are  practical  teachers  of  violence  and  wrong !  I  cannot 
think  it  will  always  be  so.  Hitherto  we  have  looked  on 
criminals  as  voluntary  enemies  of  mankind.  We  have  treat- 
ed them  as  wild  beasts,  not  as  dull  or  loitering  boys.  We 
have  sought  to  destroy  by  death,  to  disable  by  mutilation  or 
imprisonment,  to  terrify  and  subdue,  not  to  convince,  to  re- 
form, encourage,  and  bless. 

The  history  of  the  past  is  full  of  prophecy  for  the  future. 
Not  many  years  ago  we  shut  up  our  lunatics  in  jails,  in 
dungeons,  in  cages ;  we  chained  the  maniac  with  iron  ;  we 
gave  him  a  bottle  of  water  and  a  sack  of  straw ;  we  left 
him  in  filth,  in  cold  and  nakedness.  We  set  strong  and 
brutal  men  to  watch  him.  When  he  cried,  when  he  gnashed 
his  teeth  and  tore  his  hair  we  beat  him  all  the  more  !  They 
do  so  yet  in  some  places,  for  they  think  a  madman  is  not  a 
brother  but  a  devil.  What  was  the  result  ?  Madness  was 
found  incurable.  Now  lunacy  is  a  disease,  to  be  prescribed 
20* 


234  SERMON    OF    THE 

for  as  fever  or  rheumatism  ;  when  we  find  an  incurable  case 
we  do  not  kill  the  man,  nor  chain  him,  nor  count  him  a 
devil.  Yet  lunacy  is  not  curable  by  force,  by  jails,  dun- 
geons, and  cages  ;  only  by  the  medicine  of  wise  men  and 
good  men.  What  if  Christ  had  met  one  demoniac  with  a 
whip  and  another  with  chains  ! 

You  know  how  we  once  treated  criminals !  with  what 
scourgings  and  mutilations,  what  brandings,  what  tortures 
with  fire  and  red-hot  iron !  Death  was  not  punishment 
enough,  it  must  be  protracted  amid  the  most  cruel  torments 
that  quivering  flesh  could  bear.  The  multitude  looked  on 
and  learned  a  lesson  of  deadly  wickedness.  A  judicial 
murder  was  a  holiday !  It  is  but  little  more  than  two 
hundred  years  since  a  man  was  put  to  death  in  the  most 
enlightened  country  of  Europe  for  eating  meat  on  Friday ; 
not  two  hundred  since  men  and  women  were  hanged  in 
Massachusetts  for  a  crime  now  reckoned  impossible  !  It  is 
not  a  hundred  years  since  two  negro  slaves  were  judicially 
burned  alive  in  this  very  city !  These  facts  make  us  shud- 
der but  hope  also.  In  a  hundred  years  from  this  day  will 
not  men  look  on  our  gallows,  jails,  and  penal  law  as  we  look 
on  the  racks,  the  torture-chambers  of  the  middle  ages,  and 
the  bloody  code  of  remorseless  inquisitors  ? 

We  need  only  to  turn  our  attention  to  this  subject  to  find 
a  better  way.  We  shall  soon  see  that  punishment  as  such  is 
an  evil  to  the  criminal,  and  so  swells  the  sum  of  suffering 
with  which  society  runs  over ;  that  it  is  an  evil  also  to  the 
community  at  large  by  abstracting  valuable  force  from 
profitable  work,  and  so  a  loss.*  We  shall  one  day  remember 

*  The  period  of  confinement  in  our  States'  Prisons  differs  a  good 
deal  in  the  various  States,  as  will  appear  from  the  following  Table. 
Whole  No.  in  prison.  Average  sentence. 

In  Conn.  189,  March  31,  1841,          7  yrs.  3  mos. 

Va.  181,  Sept.     30,  1839,          6    "   10    " 

Mass.  322,  Sept.     30,  1840,  5    "     9   " 

La-  68,  Sept.     30,  1839,          5    «     1    « 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  235 

that  the  offender  is  a  man,  and  so  his  good  also  is  to  be  con- 
sulted. He  may  be  a  bad  man,  voluntarily  bad  if  you  will. 
Still  we  are  to  be  economical  even  of  his  suffering,  for  the 
least  possible  punishment  is  the  best.  Already  a  good  many 
men  think  that  error  is  better  refuted  by  truth  than  by 
faggots  and  axes.  How  long 'will  it  be  before  we  apply 
good  sense  and  Christianity  to  the  prevention  of  crime  ? 
One  day  we  must  see  that  a  jail,  as  it  is  now  conducted,  is 
no  more  likely  to  cure  a  crime  than  a  lunacy  or  a  fever ! 
Hitherto  we  have  not  seen  the  application  of  the  great 
doctrines  of  Christianity ;  not  felt  that  all  men  are  brothers. 
So  our  remedies  for  social  evils  have  been  bad  almost  as  the 
disease ;  remedies  which  remedied  nothing,  but  hid  the 
patient  out  of  sight.  All  great  criminals  have  been  thought 
incurable,  and  then  killed.  What  if  the  doctors  found  a 
patient  sick  of  a  disease  which  he  had  foolishly  or  wickedly 
brought  upon  himself,  and  then,  by  the  advice  of  twelve 
other  doctors,  professionally  killed  him  for  justice  or  ex- 
ample's sake  ?  They  would  do  what  all  the  States  in 
Christendom  have  done  these  thousand  years.  I  cannot  see 
why  the  Legislature  has  not  as  good  right  to  anthorize  the 
medical  college  thus  to  kill  men,  as  to  authorize  the  present 
forms  of  destroying  life  ! 

We  do  not  look  the  facts  of  crime  fairly  in  the  face.  We 
do  not  see  what  heathens  we  are.  Why,  there  is  not  a 
Christian  nation  in  the  world  that  has  not  a  Secretary  of  War, 
armies,  soldiers,  and  the  terrible  apparatus  of  destruction. 


N.  J. 

152, 

Sept.     30,  1840, 

4  yrs.  7  mos. 

Ky. 

162, 

Sept.     30,  1839, 

4   " 

B.C. 

79, 

Nov.     30,  1840, 

3   "     8   " 

Md. 

104, 

3   " 

Phila. 

129, 

Sept.     30,  1840, 

2   "     5    " 

The  difference  between  the  average  term  of  punishment  in  Con- 
necticut and  Philadelphia  is  300  per  cent. !  If  the  same  result  is 
effected  by  each,  there  has  then  been  a  great  amount  of  gratuitous 
suffering  in  one  case. 


236  SERMON    OF    THE 

But  there  is  not  one  that  has  a  Secretary  of  Peace,  not  one 
that  takes  half  the  pains  to  improve  its  own  criminals  which 
it  takes  to  build  forts  and  fleets !  Yet  it  seems  to  me  that  a 
Christian  State  should  be  a  great  peace  society,  a  society 
for  mutual  advancement  in  the  qualities  of  a  man  ! 

Do  we  not  see  that  by  our  present  course  we  are  teaching 
men  violence,  fraud,  deceit,  and  murder  ?  What  is  the 
educational  effect  of  our  present  political  conduct,  of  our 
invasions,  our  battles,  our  victories  ;  of  the  speeches  of  "  our 
great  men  ?  "  You  all  know  that  this  teaches  the  poor,  the 
low,  and  the  weak  that  murder  and  robbery  are  good  things 
when  done  on  a  large  scale  ;  that  they  give  wealth,  fame, 
power,  and  honors.  The  ignorant  man,  ill-born  and  ill- 
bred,  asks :  "  Why  not  when  done  on  a  small  scale ;  why 
not  good  for  me  ?  "  If  it  is  right  in  the  President  of  the 
United  States  to  rob  and  murder,  why  not  for  the  President 
of  the  United  States  Bank  ?  Do  famous  men  say,  "  Our 
country  however  bounded,"  and  vote  to  plunder  a  sister  State  ? 
then  why  shall  not  the  poor  man,  hungry  and  cold,  say, 
"  My  purse  however  bounded,"  and  seize  on  all  he  can  get  ? 
Give  one  a  seat  in  Congress  if  you  will,  and  the  other  a 
noose  of  hemp,  there  is  a  God  before  whom  seats  in  Con- 
gress and  hempen  halters  are  of  equal  value,  but  who  does 
justice  to  great  and  little  ! 

To  reform  the  dangerous  classes  of  society,  to  advance 
those  who  loiter  behind  our  civilization,  we  need  a  special 
work  designed  directly  for  the  good  of  the  criminals  and 
such  as  stand  on  that  perilous  ground  which  slopes  towards 
crime.  Some  good  men  undertook  this  work  long  ago. 
They  found  much  to  do ;  a  good  deal  to  encourage  them. 
Some  of  them  are  well  known  to  you,  are  laboring  here  in  the 
midst  of  us.  They  need  counsel,  encouragement,  and  aid. 
We  must  not  look  coldly  on  their  enterprise  nor  on  them. 
They  can  tell  far  better  than  I  what  specific  plans  are  best 
for  their  specific  work.  Already  have  they  accomplished 


DANGEROUS    CLASSES    IN    SOCIETY.  237 

much  in  this  noble  enterprise.  The  society  for  aiding 
discharged  convicts  is  a  prophecy  of  yet  better  things.  Soon 
I  trust  it  will  extend  its  kind  offices  to  all  the  prisons,  and  its 
work  be  made  the  affair  of  the  State.  The  plan  now  before 
your  Legislature  for  a  "  State  Manual  Labor  School,"  de- 
signed to  reform  vicious  children,  is  also  full  of  promise. 
The  wise  and  anonymous  charity  which  so  beautifully  and  in 
silence  has  dropped  its  gold  into  the  chest  for  these  poor 
outcasts,  is  itself  its  hundred-fold  reward.  Institutions  like 
that  which  we  contemplate  have  been  found  successful  in 
England,  Germany,  and  France.  They  actually  reform  the 
juvenile  delinquent  and  bring  up  useful  men,  not  hardened 
criminals.*  We  are  beginning  to  attend  to  this  special  work 
of  removing  the  causes  of  crime,  and  restoring  at  least  the 
young  offenders. 

However,  the  greater  portion  of  this  work  is  not  special 
and  for  the  criminal,  but  general  and  for  society.  To 
change  the  treatment  of  criminals,  we  must  change  every 
thing  else.  The  dangerous  class  is  the  unavoidable  result 
of  our  present  civilization  ;  of  our  present  ideas  of  man  and 
social  life.  To  reform  and  elevate  the  class  of  criminals,  we 
must  reform  and  elevate  all  other  classes.  To  do  that,  we 
must  educate  and  refine  men.  We  must  learn  to  treat  all 
men  as  brothers.  This  is  a  great  work  and  one  of  slow 
achievement.  It  cannot  be  brought  about  by  legislation, 

*  I  refer  to  the  prisons  at  Stretton-upon-Dunmore  in  Warwick- 
shire, that  at  Horn  near  Hamburg,  and  the  one  at  Mettray  near 
Tours  in  France.  The  French  penal  code  allows  the  guardian  or 
relatives  of  an  offender  under  age  to  take  him  from  prison  on  giving 
bonds  for  his  good  behavior.  While  these  pages  were  first  passing 
through  the  press,  I  learned  the  happy  effect  which  followed  the  execu- 
tion of  the  license  laws  in  this  city.  In  1846,  from  the  10th  of  March 
to  the  24th  of  April,  there  were  sent  to  the  House  of  Correction  for 
intemperance  one  hundred  eighty-nine  persons.  During  the  same 
period  of  the  year  1847,  only  eighty-four  have  been  thus  punished ! 
But  alas,  in  1851  the  evil  has  returned,  and  the  demon  of  drunkenness 
mows  down  the  wretched  in  Boston  with  unrestricted  scythe  ! 


238  SERMON    OF    THE    DANGEROUS    CLASSES. 

nor  any  mechanical  contrivance  and  re-organization  alone. 
There  is  no  remedy  for  this  evil  and  its  kindred  but  keeping 
the  laws  of  God  ;  in  one  word,  none  but  Christianity,  good- 
ness, and  piety  felt  in  the  heart,  applied  in  all  the  works  of 
life,  individually,  socially,  and  politically.  While  educated 
and  abounding  men  acknowledge  no  rule  of  conduct  but 
self-interest,  what  can  you  expect  of  the  ignorant  and  the 
perishing  ?  While  great  men  say  without  rebuke  that  we  do 
not  look  at  "  the  natural  justice  of  a  war,"  do  you  expect 
men  in  the  lowest  places  of  society,  ignorant  and  brutish, 
pinched  by  want,  to  look  at  the  natural  justice  of  theft,  of 
murder?  It  were  a  vain  expectation.  We  must  improve 
all  classes  to  improve  one  ;  perhaps  the  highest  first.  Dif- 
ferent men  acting  in  the  most  various  directions,  without 
concert,  often  jealous  one  of  another,  and  all  partial  in  their 
aims,  are  helping  forward  this  universal  result.  While  we 
are  contending  against  slavery,  war,  intemperance,  or  party 
rage,  while  we  are  building  up  hospitals,  colleges,  schools, 
while  we  are  contending  for  freedom  of  conscience,  or 
teaching  abstractly  the  love  of  man  and  love  of  God,  we  are 
all  working  for  the  welfare  of  this  neglected  class.  The 
gallows  of  the  barbarian  and  the  Gospel  of  Christianity 
cannot  exist  together.  The  times  are  full  of  promise. 
Mankind  slowly  fulfils  what  a  man  of  genius  pi'ophesies  ; 
God  grants  what  a  good  man  asks,  and  when  it  comes,  it  is 
better  than  what  he  prayed  for. 


IX. 


A  SERMON    OF   POVERTY.      PREACHED    AT   TUB    MELODEON    ON 
SUNDAY,  JANUARY   14,   1849. 


PROVERBS    X.    15. 
THE  DESTttCCTIOX  OF  THE  POOR  IS  THEIR  POVERTY. 

LAST  Sunday  something  was  said  of  riches.  To-day  I 
ask  your  attention  to  a  sermon  of  poverty.  By  poverty,  I 
mean  the  state  in  which  a  man  does  not  have  enough  to 
satisfy  the  natural  wants  of  food,  raiment,  shelter,  warmth 
and  the  like.  From  the  earliest  times  that  we  know  of, 
there  have  been  two  classes  of  men,  the  rich  who  had  more 
than  enough,  the  poor  who  had  less.  In  one  of  the  earliest 
books  which  treats  of  the  condition  of  men,  we  find  that 
Abraham,  a  rich  man,  owns  the  bodies  of  three  hundred  men 
that  are  poor.  In  four  thousand  years,  the  difference  be- 
tween rich  and  poor  in  our  part  of  America  is  a  good  deal 
lessened,  not  done  away  with.  In  New  England  property 
is  more  uniformly  distributed  than  in  most  countries,  perhaps 
more  equally  than  in  any  land  as  highly  civilized.  But  even 
here  the  old  distinction  remains  in  a  painful  form  and  ex- 
tended to  a  pitiful  degree. 

At  one  extreme  of  society  is  a  body  called  the  rich,  men 
who  have  abundance,  not  a  very  numerous  body,  but  power- 
ful, first  through  the  energy  which  accumulates  money,  and 
secondly,  through  the  money  itself.  Then  there  is  a  body 


240  SERMON    OF    POVERTY. 

of  men  who  are  comfortable.  This  class  comprises  the 
mass  of  the  people  in  fcll  the  callings  of  life.  Out  of  this 
class  the  rich  men  come,  and  into  it  their  children  or  grand- 
children commonly  return.  Few  of  the  rich  men  of  Boston 
were  sons  of  rich  men  ;  still  fewer  grandsons  ;  few  of  them 
perhaps  will  be  fathers  of  men  equally  rich;  still  fewer 
grandfathers  of  such.  Then  there  is  the  class  that  is  misera- 
ble. Some  of  them  are  supported  by  public  charity,  some 
by  private,  some  of  them  by  their  toil  alone  —  but  altogether 
they  form  a  mass  of  men  who  only  stay  in  the  world,  and 
do  not  live  in  the  best  sense  of  that  word. 

Such  are  the  great  divisions  of  society  in  respect  to 
property.  However,  the  lines  between  these  three  classes 
are  not  sharp  and  distinctly  drawn.  There  are  no  sharp 
divisions  in  nature  ;  but  for  our  convenience,  we  distinguish 
classes  by  their  centre  where  they  are  most  unlike,  and  not 
by  their  circumference  where  they  intermix  and  resemble 
each  other.  The  line  between  the  miserable  and  com- 
fortable, between  the  comfortable  and  rich,  is  not  distinctly 
drawn.  The  centre  of  each  class  is  obvious  enough  while 
the  limits  thereof  are  a  dissolving  view. 

The  poor  are  miserable.  There  food  is  the  least  that  will 
sustain  nature,  not  agreeable,  not  healthy ;  their  clothing 
scanty  and  mean,  their  dwellings  inconvenient  and  uncom- 
fortable, with  roof  and  walls  that  let  in  the  cold  and  the  rain 
—  dwellings  that  are  painful  and  unhealthy;  in  their  per- 
sonal habits  they  are  commonly  unclean.  Then  they  are 
ignorant,  they  have  no  time  to  attend  school  in  childhood, 
no  time  to  read  or  to  think  in  manhood,  even  if  they  have 
learned  to  do  either  before  that.  If  they  have  the  time,  few 
men  can  think  to  any  profit  while  the  body  is  uncomfortable. 
The  cold  man  thinks  only  of  the  cold ;  the  wretched  of  his 
misery.  Besides  this  they  are  frequently  vicious.  I  do 
not  mean  to  say  they  are  wicked  in  the  sight  of  God.  I 
never  see  a  poor  man  carried  to  jail  for  some  petty  crime,  or 
even  for  a  great  one,  without  thinking  that  probably,  in 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  241 

God's  eye,  the  man  is  far  better  than  I  am,  and  from  the 
State's  prison  or  scaffold,  will  ascend  into  heaven  and  take 
rank  a  great  ways  before  me.  I  do  not  mean  to  say  they 
are  wicked  before  God ;  but  it  is  they  who  commit  the 
minor  crimes  against  decency,  sobriety,  against  property 
and  person,  and  most  of  the  major  crimes  —  against  human 
life.  I  mean  that  they  commit  the  crimes  that  get  punished 
by  law.  They  crowd  your  courts,  they  tenant  your  jails ; 
they  occupy  your  gallows.  If  some  man  would  write  a 
book  describing  the  life  of  all  the  men  hanged  in  Massa- 
chusetts for  fifty  years  past,  or  tried  for  some  capital  offence, 
and  show  what  class  of  society  they  were  from,  how  they 
were  bred,  what  influences  were  about  them  in  childhood, 
how  they  passed  their  Sundays,  and  also  describe  the  con- 
figuration of  their  bodies,  it  would  help  us  to  a  valuable 
chapter  in  the  philosophy  of  crime,  and  furnish  mighty 
argument  against  the  injustice  of  our  mode  of  dealing  with 
offenders. 

Poverty  is  the  dark  side  of  modern  society.  I  say  modern 
society,  though  poverty  is  not  modern,  for  ancient  society 
had  poverty  worse  than  ours  and  a  side  still  darker  yet. 
Cannibalism  ;  butchery  of  captives  after  battle  ;  frequent  or 
continual  wars  for  the  sake  of  plunder;  and  the  slavery  of 
the  weak,  these  were  the  dark  side  of  society  in  four  great 
periods  of  human  history,  the  savage,  the  barbarous,  the 
classic  and  the  feudal.  Poverty  is  the  best  of  these  five  bad 
things,  each  of  which,  however,  has  grimly  done  its  service 
in  its  day. 

There  is  no  poverty  among  the  Gaboon  negroes.  Put 
them  in  our  latitude,  and  it  soon  comes.  Nay,  as  they  get 
to  learn  the  wants  of  cultivated  men,  there  will  be  a  poorer 
class  even  in  the  torrid  zone.  Poverty  prevails  in  every 
civilized  nation  on  earth  ;  yes,  in  every  savage  nation  in 
austere  climes.  Let  us  look  at  some  examples.  England 
is  the  richest  country  in  Europe.  I  mean  she  has  more 
wealth  in  proportion  to  her  population  than  any  other  in 
21 


242  SERMON    OF    POVERTY. 

a  similar  climate.  Look  at  her  possessions  in  every  corner 
of  the  globe  ;  at  her  armies  which  Europe  cannot  conquer ; 
at  her  ships  which  weave  the  great  commercial  web  that 
spreads  all  round  about  the  world ;  at  home  what  factories, 
what  farms,  what  houses,  what  towns,  what  a  vast  and 
wealthy  metropolis ;  what  an  artistocracy  —  so  rich,  so 
cultivated,  so  able,  so  daring,  and  so  unconquered. 

But  in  that  very  English  nation  the  most  frightful  poverty 
exists.  Look  at  the  two  sister  islands :  this  the  queen  and 
that  the  beggar  of  all  nations ;  the  rose  and  the  shamrock ; 
the  one  throned  in  royal  beauty,  the  other  bowed  to  the  dust, 
torn  and  trampled  under  foot.  In  that  capital  of  the  world's 
wealth  ;  in  that  centre  of  power  far  greater  than  the  power 
of  all  the  Csesars,  there  is  the  most  squalid  poverty.  Look 
at  St.  Giles  and  St.  James  —  that  the  earthly  hell  of  want 
and  crime,  this  the  worldly  heaven  of  luxury  and  power !  Put 
on  the  one  side  the  stately  nobility  of  England,  well  born, 
well  bred,  armed  with  the  power  of  manners,  the  power  of 
money,  the  power  of  culture  and  the  power  of  place,  and  on 
the  other  side  put  the  beggary  of  England,  the  two  million 
paupers  who  are  kept  wholly  on  public  or  private  charity ; 
the  three  million  laborers  who  formerly  fed  on  potatoes,  God 
knows  what  they  feed  on  now,  and  all  the  other  hungry  sons 
of  want  who  are  kept  in  awe  only  by  the  growling  lion  who 
guards  the  British  throne  ;  and  you  see  at  once  the  result  of 
modern  civilization  in  the  ablest,  the  foremost,  the  freest, 
the  most  practical  and  the  richest  nation  in  the  old  world. 

Even  here  in  New  England,  a  country  not  two  hundred 
and  fifty  years  old,  a  little  patch  of  cleared  land  on  the  edge 
of  the  continent,  we  hear  of  poverty  which  is  frightful  to 
think  of.  It  is  a  serious  question  what  shall  be  done  for  the 
poor ;  there  are  few  that  can  tell  what  shall  be  done  with 
them,  or  what  is  to  become  of  them.  Want  is  always  here 
in  Boston.  Misery  is  here.  Starvation  is  not  unknown. 
What  is  now  serious  will  one  day  be  alarming.  Even  now 
it  is  awful  to  think  of  the  misery  that  lurks  in  this  Christian 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  243 

town.  New  England  in  fifty  years  has  increased  vastly  in 
wealth,  but  poverty  increases  too.  There  has  been  a 
great  advance  in  the  productiveness  of  human  labor ;  with 
our  tools  a  man  can  do  as  much  rude  work  in  one  day  as  he 
could  in  three  days  a  hundred  years  ago.  I  mean  work  with 
the  axe,  the  plough,  the  spade  ;  of  nicer  work,  yet  more  ;  of 
the  most  delicate  work,  see  what  machines  do  for  him.  The 
end  is  not  yet ;  soon  we  shall  have  engines  that  will  whittle 
granite,  as  a  gang  of  saws  cleaves  logs  into  broad  smooth 
boards.  Yet  with  all  this  advance  in  the  productiveness  of 
human  toil,  still  there  is  poverty.  A  day's  work  now  will 
bring  a  man  greater  proportionate  pay  than  ever  before  in 
New  England.  I  mean  to  say  that  the  ordinary  wages  for 
an  ordinary  day's  work  will  support  a  man  comfortably  and 
respectably  longer  than  they  ever  would  before.  On  the 
whole,  the  price  of  things  has  come  down  and  the  price  of 
work  has  gone  up.  Yet  still  there  are  the  poor ;  there  is 
want,  there  is  misery,  there  is  starvation.  The  community 
gives  more  than  ever  before  ;  a  better  public  provision  is 
made  for  the  poor,  private  benevolence  is  more  active  and 
works  far  more  wisely  —  yet  still  there  is  poverty,  want, 
misery  unremoved,  unmitigated,  and,  many  think,  immiti- 
gable ! 

Now  I  am  not  going  to  deny  that  poverty,  like  other  forms 
of  suffering,  plays  a  part  in  the  economy  of  the  human 
race.  If  God's  children  will  not  work,  or  will  throw  away 
their  bread,  I  do  not  complain  that  He  sends  them  to  bed 
without  their  supper  —  to  a  hard  bed  and  a  narrow  and  a 
cold.  "  Earn  your  breakfast  before  you  eat  it,"  is  not 
merely  the  counsel  of  Poor  Richard,  but  of  Almighty  God  ; 
it  is  a  just  counsel,  and  not  hard.  But  is  poverty  an 
essential,  substantial,  integral  element  in  human  civilization, 
or  is  it  an  accidental  element  thereof,  and  transiently  pres- 
ent ;  is  it  amenable  to  suppression  ?  For  my  own  part,  I 
believe  that  all  evil  is  transient,  a  thing  that  belongs  to  the 
process  of  development,  not  to  the  nature  of  man,  or  the 


244  SERMON    OF    POVERTY. 

higher  forms  of  social  life  towards  which  he  is  advancing. 
If  God  be  absolutely  good,  then  only  good  things  are  ever- 
lasting. This  general  opinion  which  comes  from  my  re- 
ligion as  well  as  my  philosophy,  affects  my  special  opinion 
of  the  history  and  design  of  poverty.  I  look  on  it  as  on 
cannibalism,  the  butchery  of  captives,  the  continual  war  for 
the  sake  of  plunder,  or  on  slavery ;  yes,  as  I  look  on  the 
diseases  incident  to  childhood,  things  that  mankind  live 
through  and  outgrow ;  which,  painful  as  they  are,  do  not 
make  up  the  greatest  part  of  the  entire  life  of  mankind.  If 
it  shall  be  said  that  I  cannot  know  this,  that  I  have  not  a 
clear  intellectual  perception  of  the  providential  design  there- 
of, or  the  means  of  its  removal,  still  I  believe  it,  and  if  I 
have  not  the  knowledge  which  comes  of  philosophy,  I  have 
still  faith,  the  result  of  instinctive  tijist  in  God. 

Let  us  look  a  little  at  the  causes  of  poverty.  Some  things 
we  see  best  on  a  large  scale.  So  let  us  look  at  poverty,  and 
then  come  down  to  the  smaller  forms  thereof. 

I.  There  may  be  a  natural  and  organic  cause.  The 
people  of  Lapland,  Iceland  and  Greenland  are  a  poor  people 
compared  with  the  Scotch,  the  Danes,  or  the  French.  There 
is  a  natural  and  organic  cause  for  their  poverty  in  the  soil 
and  climate  of  those  countries,  which  cannot  be  changed. 
They  must  emigrate  before  they  can  become  rich  or  com- 
fortable, in  our  sense  of  the  word.  Hence  their  poverty  is 
to  be  attributed  to  their  geographical  position.  Put  the  New 
Englanders  there,  even  they  would  be  a  poor  people.  Thus 
the  poverty  of  a  nation  may  depend  on  the  geographical 
position  of  the  nation. 

Suppose  a  race  of  men  has  little  vigor  of  body  or  of  mind, 
and  yet  the  same  natural  wants  as  a  vigorous  race  ;  put  them 
in  favorable  circumstances,  in  a  good  climate,  on  a  rich  soil, 
they  will  be  poor  on  account  of  the  feebleness  of  their  mind 
and  body ;  put  them  in  a  stern  climate,  on  a  sterile  soil,  and 
they  will  perish.  Such  is  the  case  with  the  Mexicans.  Soil 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  245 

and  climate  are  favorable,  yet  the  people  are  poor.  Suppose 
a  nation  had  only  one  third  part  of  the  Laplander's  ability, 
and  yet  needed  the  result  of  all  his  power,  and  was  put  in 
the  Laplander's  position,  they  would  not  live  through  the 
first  winter.  Had  they  been  Mexicans  who  came  to  Ply- 
mouth in  1620,  not  one  of  them,  it  is  probable,  would  have 
seen  the  next  summer.  Take  away  half  the  sense  or 
bodily  strength  of  the  Bushmans  of  South  Africa,  and 
though  they  might  have  sense  enough  to  dig  nuts  out  of  the 
ground,  yet  the  lions  and  hyenas  would  eventually  eat  up 
the  whole  nation.  So  the  poverty  of  a  nation  may  come 
from  want  of  power  of  body  or  of  mind. 

Then  if  a  nation  increases  in  numbers  more  rapidly  than 
in  wealth,  there  is  a  corresponding  increase  of  want.  Let 
the  number  of  births  in  England  for  the  next  ten  years  be 
double  the  number  for  the  last  ten,  without  a  corresponding 
creation  of  new  wealth,  and  the  English  are  brought  to  the 
condition  of  the  Irish.  Let  the  number  of  births  in  Ireland 
in  like  manner  multiply,  and  one  half  the  population  must 
perish  for  want  of  food.  So  the  poverty  of  a  nation  may 
depend  on  the  disproportionate  increase  of  its  numbers. 

Then  an  able  race,  under  favorable  outward  circum 
stances,  without  an  over- rapid  increase  of  numbers,  if  its 
powers  are  not  much  developed,  will  be  poor  in  comparison 
with  a  similar  race  under  similar  circumstances,  but  highly 
developed.  Thus  England,  under  Egbert  in  the  ninth 
century,  was  poor  compared  with  England  under  Victoria 
in  the  nineteenth  century.  The  single  town  of  Liverpool, 
Manchester,  Birmingham,  or  even  Sheffield,  is  probably 
worth  many  times  the  wealth  of  all  England  in  the  ninth 
century.  So  the  poverty  of  a  nation  may  depend  on  its 
want  of  development. 

Old  England  and  New  England  are  rich,  partly  through 

the  circumstances  of  climate  and   soil,   partly  and  chiefly 

through  the   great  vigor   of  the  race,  with  only  a  normal 

increase  of  numbers,  and  partly  through  a  more  complete 

21* 


246  SERMON    OF    PO  VERT  ST. 

development  of  the  nations.  Such  are  the  chief  natural 
and  organic  causes  of  poverty  on  a  large  scale  in  a  nation. 

II.  The  causes  may  be  political.  By  political,  I  mean 
such  as  are  brought  about  by  the  laws,  either  the  funda- 
mental laws,  the  constitution,  or  the  minor  laws,  statutes. 
Sometimes  the  laws  tend  to  make  the  whole  nation  poor. 
Such  are  the  laws  which  force  the  industry  of  the  people 
out  of  the  natural  channel,  restricting  commerce,  agricul- 
ture, manufactures,  industry  in  general.  Sometimes  this  is 
done  by  promoting  war,  by  keeping  up  armies  and  navies, 
by  putting  the  destructive  work  of  fighting,  or  the  merely 
conservative  work  of  ruling,  before  the  creative  works  of 
productive  industry.  France  was  an  example  of  that  a 
hundred  years  ago.  Spain  yet  continues  such,  as  she  has 
been  for  two  centuries. 

Sometimes  this  is  done  by  hindering  the  general  develop- 
ment of  the  nation,  by  retarding  education,  by  forbidding 
all  freedom  of  thought.  The  States  of  the  Church  are  an 
example  of  this  when  compared  with  Tuscany;,  all  Italy 
and  Austria,  when  compared  with  England  ;  Spain,  when 
compared  with  Germany,  France,  and  Holland. 

Sometimes  this  is  brought  about  by  keeping  up  an  unnatu- 
ral institution  —  as  slavery,  for  example.  South  Carolina 
is  an  instance  of  this,  when  compared  with  Massachusetts. 
South  Carolina  has  many  advantages  over  us,  yet  South 
Carolina  is  poor  while  Massachusetts  is  rich. 

Sometimes  this  political  action  primarily  affects  only  the 
distribution  of  wealth,  and  so  makes  one  class  rich  and 
another  poor.  Such  is  the  case  with  laws  which  give  all  the 
real  estate  to  the  oldest  son,  laws  which  allow  property  to 
be  entailed  for  a  long  time  or  for  ever,  laws  which  cut  men 
off  from  the  land.  These  laws  at  first  seem  only  to  make  one 
class  rich  and  the  others  poor,  and  merely  to  affect  the 
distribution  of  wealth  in  a  nation,  but  they  are  unnatural 
and  retard  the  industry  of  the  people,  and  diminish  their 
productive  power,  and.  make  the  whole  nation  less  rich. 


SERMON    OP    POVERTY.  247 

Legislation  may  favor  wealth  and  not  men  —  property 
which  is  accumulated  labor,  rather  than  labor  which  is  the 
power  that  accumulates  property.  Such  legislation  always 
endangers  wealth  in  the  end,  lessening  its  quantity  and 
making  its  tenure  uncertain. 

Two  things  may  be  said  of  European  legislation  in 
general,  and  especially  of  English  legislation.  First,  That 
it  has  aimed  to  concentrate  wealth  in  the  hands  of  a  few 
and  keep  it  there.  Hence  it  favors  primogeniture,  entails 
monopolies  of  posts  of  profit  and  of  honor.  Second,  It  has 
always  looked  out  for  the  proprietor  and  his  property,  and 
cared  little  for  the  man  without  property ;  hence  it  always 
wanted  the  price  of  things  high,  the  wages  of  men  low, 
and  in  addition  to  natural  and  organic  obstacles,  it  continu- 
ally put  social  impediments  in  the  poor  man's  way.  In 
England  no  son  of  a  laborer  could  rise  to  eminence  in  the 
law  or  in  the  medicine,  scarcely  in  the  church  ;  no,  not 
even  in  the  army  or  navy. 

These  two  statements  will  bear  examination.  The  genius 
of  England  has  demanded  these  two  things.  The  genius  of 
America  demands  neither,  but  rejects  both  ;  demands  the 
distribution  of  property,  puts  the  rights  of  man  first,  the 
rights  of  things  last.  Such  are  the  political  causes,  and 
such  their  effects. 

III.  Then  there  are  social  causes  which  make  a  nation 
poor.  Such  are  the  prevalence  of  an  opinion  that  industry 
is  not  respectable ;  that  it  is  honorable  to  consume,  dis- 
graceful to  create  ;  that  much  must  be  spent,  though  little 
earned.  The  Spanish  nation  is  poor  in  part  through  the 
prevalence  of  this  opinion. 

Sometimes  social  causes  seem  only  to  affect  a  class. 
The  Pariahs  in  India  must  not  fill  any  office  that  is  well 
paid.  They  are  despised,  and  of  course  they  are  poor  and 
miserable.  The  blacks  in  New  England  are  despised  and 
frowned  down,  not  admitted  to  the  steamboat,  the  omnibus, 
to  the  school-houses  in  Boston,  or  even  to  the  meeting-house 


248  SERMON    OF    POVERTY. 

with  white  men ;  not  often  allowed  to  work  in  company 
with  the  whites ;  and  so  they  are  kept  in  poverty.  In 
Europe  the  Jews  have  been  equally  despised  and  treated  in 
the  same  way,  but  not  made  poor,  because  they  are  in 
many  respects  a  superior  race  of  men,  and  because  they 
have  the  advantage  of  belonging  to  a  nation  whose  civiliza- 
tion is  older  than  any  other  in  Europe ;  a  nation  specially 
gifted  with  the  faculty  of  thrift ;  a  tribe  whom  none  but 
other  Jews,  Scotchmen,  or  New  Englanders,  could  outwit, 
over-reach,  and  make  poor.  No  Ferdinand  and  Isabella, 
no  inquisition  could  so  completely  expel  them  from  any 
country,  as  the  superior  craft  and  cunning  of  the  Yankee 
has  driven  them  out  of  New  England.  There  are  Jews  in 
every  country  of  Europe,  everywhere  despised  and  mal- 
treated, and  forced  into  the  corners  of  society,  but  every- 
where superior  to  the  men  who  surround  them.  Such  are 
the  social  causes  which  produce  poverty. 

Now  let  us  look  at  the  matter  on  a  smaller  scale,  and  see 
the  cause  of  poverty  in  New  England,  of  poverty  in  Broad 
street  and  Sea  street.  From  the  great  mass  let  me  take  out 
a  class  who  are  accidentally  poor.  There  are  the  widows 
and  orphan  children  who  inherit  no  estate  ;  the  able  men 
reduced  by  sickness  before  they  have  accumulated  enough 
to  sustain  them.  Then  let  me  take  out  a  class  of  men  tran- 
siently poor,  men  who  start  with  nothing,  but  have  vigor 
and  will  to  make  their  own  way  in  the  world.  The 
majority  of  the  poor  still  remain  —  the  class  who  are  per- 
manently poor.  The  accidentally  poor  can  easily  be  taken 
care  of  by  public  or  private  charity  ;  the  transient  poor  will 
soon  take  care  of  themselves.  The  young  man  who  lives 
on  six  cents  a  day  while  studying  medicine  in  Boston,  is 
doubtless  a  poor  man,  but  will  soon  repay  society  for  the 
slight  aid  it  has  lent  him,  and  in  time  will  take  care  of  other 
poor  men.  So  these  two  classes,  the  accidental  and  the  tran- 
sient poor,  can  easily  be  disposed  of. 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  249 

What  causes  have  produced  the  class  that  is  permanently 
poor  ?  What  has  just  been  said  of  nations,  is  true  also  of 
individuals. 

First,  there  are  natural  and  organic  causes  of  poverty. 
Some  men  are  born  into  the  midst  of  want,  ignorance, 
idleness,  filthiness,  intemperance,  vice,  crime  ;  their  earliest 
associations  are  debasing,  their  companions  bad.  They  are 
born  into  the  Iceland  of  society,  into  the  frigid  zone,  some 
of  them  under  the  very  pole-star  of  want.  Such  men  are 
born  and  bred  under  the  greatest  disadvantages.  Every 
star  in  their  horoscope  has  a  malignant  aspect,  and  sheds 
disastrous  influence.  I  do  not  remember  five  men  in 
New  England,  from  that  class,  becoming  distinguished  in 
any  manly  pursuit,  —  not  five.  Almost  all  of  our  great 
men  and  our  rich  men  came  from  the  comfortable  class, 
none  from  the  miserable.  The  old  poverty  is  parent  of  new 
poverty.  It  takes  at  least  two  generations  to  outgrow  the 
pernicious  influence  of  such  circumstances. 

Then  much  of  the  permanent  poverty  comes  from  the 
lack  of  ability,  power  of  body  and  of  mind.  In  that  Ice- 
land of  society  men  are  commonly  born  with  a  feeble 
organization,  and  bred  under  every  physical  disadvantage  ; 
the  man  is  physically  weak,  or  else  runs  to  muscle  and  not 
brain,  and  so  is  mentally  weak.  His  feebleness  is  the  result 
of  the  poverty  of  his  fathers,  and  his  own  want  in  childhood. 
The  oak  tree  grows  tall  and  large  in  a  rich  valley,  stunted, 
small,  and  scrubby  on  the  barren  sand. 

Again  this  class  of  men  increase  most  rapidly  in  numbers. 
When  the  poor  man  has  not  half  enough  to  fill  his  own  mouth, 
and  clothe  his  own  back,  other  backs  are  added,  other  mouths 
opened.  He  abounds  in  nothing  but  naked  and  hungry  chil- 
dren. 

Further  still,  he  has  not  so  good  a  chance  as  the  com- 
fortable to  get  education  and  general  development.  A  rude 
man,  with  superior  abilities,  in  this  century,  will  often  be 
distanced  by  the  well  trained  man  who  started  at  birth  with 


250  SERMON  OF  POVERTY. 

inferior  powers.  But  if  the  rude  man  begin  with  inferior 
abilities,  inferior  circumstances,  encumbered  also  with  a 
load  becoming  rapidly  more  burthensome,  you  see  under 
what  accumulated  disadvantages  he  labors  all  his  life.  So 
to  the  first  natural  and  organic  cause  of  poverty,  his  unto- 
ward position  in  society ;  to  the  second,  his  inferior 
ability ;  and  to  the  third,  the  increase  of  his  family,  exces- 
sively rapid,  we  must  add  a  fourth  cause,  his  inferior  develop- 
ment. An  ignorant  man,  who  is  also  weak  in  body,  and 
besides  that,  starts  with  every  disadvantage,  his  burthens 
annually  increasing,  may  be  expected  to  continue  a  poor 
man.  It  is  only  in  most  extraordinary  cases  that  it  turns 
out  otherwise. 

To  these  causes  we  must  add  what  comes  therefrom  as 
their  joint  result :  idleness,  by  which  the  poor  waste  their 
time ;  thriftlessness  and  improvidence,  by  which  they  lose 
their  opportunities  and  squander  their  substance.  The  poor 
are  seldom  so  economical  as  the  rich ;  it  is  so  with  children, 
they  spoil  the  furniture,  soil  and  rend  their  garments,  put  things 
to  a  wasteful  use,  consume  heedlessly  and  squander,  careless 
of  to-morrow.  The  poor  are  the  children  of  society. 

To  these  five  causes  I  must  add  intemperance,  the  great 
bane  of  the  miserable  class.  I  feel  no  temptation  to  be 
drunken,  but  if  I  were  always  miserable,  cold,  hungry, 
naked,  so  ignorant  that  I  did  not  know  the  result  of  violat- 
ing God's  laws,  had  I  been  surrounded  from  youth  with  the 
worst  examples,  not  respected  by  other  men,  but  a  loath- 
some object  in  their  sight,  not  even  respecting  myself,  I 
can  easily  understand  how  the  temporary  madness  of  strong 
drink  would  be  a  most  welcome  thing.  The  poor  are  the 
prey  of  the  rum-seller.  As  the  lion  in  the  Hebrew  wilder- 
ness eateth  up  the  wild  ass,  so  in  modern  society  the  rum- 
seller  and  rum-maker  suck  the  bones  of  the  miserable  poor. 
I  never  hear  of  a  great  fortune  made  in  the  liquor  trade,  but 
I  think  of  the  wives  that  have  been  made  widows  thereby, 
of  the  children  bereft  of  their  parents,  of  the  fathers  and 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  251 

mothers  whom  strong  drink  has  brought  down  to  shame,  to 
crime,  and  to  ruin.  The  history  of  the  first  barrel  of  rum 
that  ever  visited  New  England  is  well  known.  It  brought 
some  forty  men  before  the  bar  of  the  court.  The  history  of 
the  last  barrel  can  scarcely  be  much  better. 

Such  are  the  natural  and  organic  causes  which  make 
poverty. 

With  the  exception  of  laws  which  allow  the  sale  of  intox- 
icating drink,  I  think  there  are  few  political  causes  of  poverty 
in  New  England,  and  they  are  too  inconsiderable  to  mention 
in  so  brief  a  sketch  as  this.  However,  there  are  some  social 
causes  of  our  permanent  poverty.  I  do  not  think  we  have 
much  respect  for  the  men  who  do  the  rude  work  of  life, 
however  faithfully  and  well !  —  little  respect  for  work  itself. 
The  rich  man  is  ashamed  to  have  begun  to  make  his  fortune 
with  his  own  hard  hands ;  even  if  the  rich  man  is  not,  his 
daughter  is  for  him.  I  do  not  think  we  have  cared  much  to 
respect  the  humble  efforts  of  feeble  men ;  not  cared  much 
to  have  men  dear,  and  things  cheap.  It  has  not  been  thought 
the  part  of  political  economy,  of  sound  legislation,  or  of 
pure  Christianity,  to  hinder  the  increase  of  pauperism,  to 
remove  the  causes  of  poverty,  yes,  the  causes  of  crime  — 
only  to  take  vengeance  on  it  when  committed  ! 

Boston  is  a  strange  place  ;  here  is  energy  enough  to  con- 
quer half  the  continent  in  ten  years ;  power  of  thought  to 
seize  and  tame  the  Connecticut  and  the  Merrimack  ;  charity 
enough  to  send  missionaries  all  over  the  world,  but  not  jus- 
tice enough  to  found  a  high  school  for  her  own  daughters, 
or  to  forbid  her  richest  citizens  from  letting  bar-rooms  as 
nurseries  of  poverty  and  crime,  from  opening  wide  gates 
which  lead  to  the  alms  house,  the  jail,  the  gallows,  and 
earthly  hell ! 

Such  are  the  causes  of  poverty,  organic,  political,  social. 
You  may  see  families  pass  from  the  comfortable  to  the  mis- 
erable class,  by  intemperance,  idleness,  wastefulness,  even 


252  SERMON  OF  POVERTY. 

by  feebleness  of  body  and  of  mind  ;  yet  while  it  is  common 
for  the  rich  to  descend  into  the  comfortable  class,  solely  by 
lack  of  the  eminent  thrift  which  raised  their  fathers  thence, 
or  because  they  lack  the  common  stimulus  to  toil,  and  save, 
it  is  not  common  for  the  comfortable  to  fall  into  the  pit  of 
misery  in  New  England,  except  through  wickedness,  through 
idleness,  or  intemperance. 

It  is  not  easy  to  study  poverty  in  Boston.  But  take  a  lit- 
tle inland  town,  which  few  persons  migrate  into,  you  will 
find  the  miserable  families  have  commonly  been  so,  for  a 
hundred  years ;  that  many  of  them  are  descended  from  the 
"  servants,"  or  white  slaves,  brought  here  by  our  fathers  ; 
that  such  as  fall  from  the  comfortable  classes,  are  commonly 
made  miserable  by  their  own  fault,  sometimes  by  idleness, 
which  is  certainly  a  sin,  for  any  man  who  will  not  work,  and 
persists  in  living,  eats  the  bread  of  some  other  man,  either 
begged  or  stolen  —  but  chiefly  by  intemperance.  Three 
fourths  of  the  poverty  of  this  character,  is  to  be  attributed 
to  this  cause. 

Now  there  is  a  tendency  in  poverty  to  drive  the  ablest 
men  to  work,  and  so  get  rid  of  the  poverty,  and  this  I  take 
it  is  the  providential  design  thereof.  Poverty,  like  an  armed 
man,  stalks  in  the  rear  of  the  social  march,  huge  and  hag- 
gard, and  gaunt  and  grim,  to  scare  the  lazy,  to  goad  the  idle 
with  his  sword,  to  trample  and  slay  the  obstinate  sluggard. 
But  he  treads  also  the  feeble  under  his  feet,  for  no  fault  of 
theirs,  only  for  the  misfortune  of  being  born  in  the  rear  of 
society.  But  in  poverty  there  is  also  a  tendency  to  intimi- 
date, to  enfeeble,  to  benumb.  The  poverty  of  the  strong 
man  compels  him  to  toil ;  but  with  the  weak,  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  poor  is  his  poverty.  An  active  man  is  awakened 
from  his  sleep  by  the  cold  ;  he  arises  and  seeks  more  cover- 
ing ;  the  indolent,  or  the  feeble,  shiver  on  till  morning, 
benumbed  and  enfeebled  by  the  cold.  So  weakness  begets 
weakness ;  poverty,  poverty  ;  intemperance,  intemperance 
crime,  crime* 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  253 

Every  thing  is  against  the  poor  man  ;  he  pays  the  dearest 
tax,  the  highest  rent  for  his  house,  the  dearest  price  for  all 
he  eats  or  wears.  The  poor  cannot  watch  their  opportunity, 
and  take  advantage  of  the  markets,  as  other  men.  They 
have  the  most  numerous  temptations  to  intemperance  and 
crime ;  they  have  the  poorest  safeguards  from  these  evils.  If 
the  chief  value  of  wealth,  as  a  rich  man  tells  us,  be  this  — 
that  "  it  renders  its  owner  independent  of  others,"  then  on 
what  shall  the  poor  men  lean,  neglected  and  despised  by 
others,  looked  on  as  loathsome,  and  held  in  contempt,  shut 
out  even  from  the  sermons  and  the  prayers  of  respectable 
men  ?  It  is  no  marvel  if  they  cease  to  respect  themselves. 

The  poor  are  the  most  obnoxious  to  disease ;  their  chil- 
dren are  not  only  most  numerous,  but  most  unhealthy.  More 
than  half  of  the  children  of  that  class,  perish  at  the  age  of 
five.  Amongst  the  poor,  infectious  diseases  rage  with 
frightful  violence.  The  mortality  in  that  class  is  amazing. 
If  things  are  to  continue  as  now,  I  thank  God  it  is  so.  If 
Death  is  their  only  guardian,  he  is  at  least  powerful,  and  does 
not  scorn  his  work. 

In  addition  to  the  poor,  whom  these  causes  have  made  and 
kept  in  poverty,  the  needy  of  other  lands  flock  hither.  The 
nobility  of  old  England,  so  zealous  in  pursuing  their  game, 
in  keeping  their  entails  unbroken,  and  primogeniture  safe, 
have  sent  their  beggary  to  New  England,  to  be  supported 
by  the  crumbs  that  fall  from  our  table.  So,  in  the  same 
New  England  city,  the  extremes  of  society  are  brought 
together.  Here  is  health,  elegance,  cultivation,  sobriety, 
decency,  refinement  —  I  wish  there  was  more  of  it ;  there 
is  poverty,  ignorance,  drunkenness,  violence,  crime,  in  most 
odious  forms  —  starvation  !  We  have  our  St.  Giles's  and  St. 
James's ;  our  nobility,  not  a  whit  less  noble  than  the  noblest 
of  other  lands,  and  our  beggars,  both  in  a  Christian  city. 
Amid  the  needy  population,  Misery  and  Death  have  found 
their  parish.  Who  shall  dare  stop  his  ears,  wh£n  they 
preach  their  awful  denunciation  of  want  and  woe  ? 
22 


254  SERMON    OF    POVERTY. 

Good  men  ask,  What  shall  we  do  ?  Foreign  poverty  has 
had  this  good  effect ;  it  has  shamed  or  frightened  the  Ameri- 
can beggar  into  industry  and  thrift. 

Poverty  will  not  be  removed  till  the  causes  thereof  are 
removed.  There  are  some  who  look  for  a  great  social  revo- 
lution. So  do  I ;  only  I  do  not  look  for  it  to  come  about 
suddenly,  or  by  mechanical  means.  We  are  in  a  social 
revolution,  and  do  not  know  it.  While  I  cannot  accept 
the  peculiar  doctrines  of  the  Associationists,  I  rejoice  in  their 
existence.  I  sympathize  with  their  hope.  They  point  out 
the  evils  of  society,  and  that  is  something.  They  propose 
a  method  of  removing  its  evils.  I  do  not  believe  in  that 
method,  but  mankind  will  probably  make  many  experiments 
before  we  hit  upon  the  right  one.  For  my  own  part,  I  con- 
fess I  do  not  see  any  way  of  removing  poverty  wholly  or 
entirely,  in  one  or  two,  or  in  four  or  five  generations.  I 
think  it  will  linger  for  some  ages  to  come.  Like  the  snow, 
it  is  to  be  removed  by  a  general  elevation  of  the  temperature 
of  the  air,  not  all  at  once,  and  will  long  hang  about  the  dark 
and  cold  places  of  the  world.  But  I  do  think  it  will  at  last 
be  overcome,  so  that  a  man  who  cannot  subsist,  will  be  as 
rare  as  a  cannibal.  "  Ye  have  the  poor  with  you  always," 
said  Jesus,  and  many  who  remember  this,  forget  that  he  also 
said,  "and  when  soever  ye  will,  ye  may  do  them  good." 
I  expect  to  see  a  mitigation  of  poverty  in  this  country,  and 
that  before  long. 

It  is  likely  that  the  legal  theory  of  property  in  Europe 
will  undergo  a  great  change  before  many  years  ;  that  the 
right  to  bequeath  enormous  estates  to  individuals  will  be 
cut  off;  that  primogeniture  will  cease,  and  entailments  be 
broken,  and  all  monopolies  of  rank  and  power  come  to  an 
end,  and  so  a  great  change  take  place  in  the  social  condition 
of  Europe,  and  especially  of  England.  That  change  will 
bring  many  of  the  comfortable  into  the  rich  class,  and  even- 
tually many  of  the  miserable  into  the  comfortable  class. 


SERMON    OF    POVERTV.  255 

But  I  do  not  expect  such  a  radical  change  here,  where  we 
have  not  such  enormous  abuses  to  surmount 

I  think  something  will  be  done  in  Europe  for  the  organi- 
zation of  labor,  I  do  not  know  what ;  I  do  not  know  how ;  I 
have  not  the  ability  to  know  ;  and  will  not  pretend  to  criticise 
what  I  know  I  cannot  create,  and  do  not  at  present  under- 
stand. I  think  there  will  be  a  great  change  in  the  form  of 
society ;  that  able  men  will  endeavor  to  remove  the  causes 
of  crime,  not  merely  to  make  money  out  of  that  crime ;  that 
intemperance  will  be  diminished  ;  that  idleness  in  rich  or 
poor  will  be  counted  a  disgrace  ;  that  labor  will  be  more 
respected  ;  education  more  widely  diffused ;  and  that  insti- 
tutions will  be  founded,  which  will  tend  to  produce  these 
results.  But  I  do  not  pretend  to  devise  those  institutions, 
and  certainly  shall  not  throw  obstacles  in  the  way  of  such 
as  can  or  will  try.  It  seems  likely  that  something  will  be 
first  done  in  Europe,  where  the  need  is  greatest.  There  a 
change  must  come.  By  and  by,  if  it  does  not  come  peace- 
ably, the  continent  will  not  furnish  "  special  constables " 
enough  to  put  down  human  nature.  If  the  white  republi- 
cans cannot  make  a  revolution  peacefully,  wait  a  little,  and 
the  red  republicans  will  make  it  in  blood.  "  Peaceably  if 
we  can,  forcibly  if  we  must,"  says  mankind,  first  in  a  whis- 
per, then  in  a  voice  of  thunder.  If  powerful  men  will  not 
write  justice  with  black  ink,  on  white  paper,  ignorant  and 
violent  men  will  write  it  on  the  soil,  in  letters  of  blood,  and 
illuminate  their  rude  legislation  with  burning  castles,  pala- 
ces and  towns.  While  the  social  change  is  taking  place 
never  so  peacefully,  men  will  think  the  world  is  going  to 
ruin.  But  it  is  an  old  world,  pretty  well  put  together,  and, 
with  all  these  changes,  will  probably  last  some  time  longer. 
Human  society  is  like  one  of  those  enormous  boulders,  so 
nicely  poised  on  another  rock,  that  a  man  may  move  it  with 
a  single  hand.  You  are  afraid  to  come  under  its  sides,  lest 
it  fall.  When  the  wind  blows,  it  rocks  with  formidable 
noise,  and  men  say  it  will  soon  be  down  upon  us.  Now  and 


256  SERMON    OP    POVERTY. 

then  a  rude  boy  undertakes  to  throw  it  over,  but  all  the  men 
who  can  get  their  shoulders  under,  cannot  raise  the  ponder- 
ous mass  from  its  solid  and  firm-set  base. 

Still,  after  all  these  changes  have  taken  place,  there  remains 
the  difference  between  the  strong  and  the  weak,  the  active 
and  the  idle,  the  thrifty  and  the  spendthrift,  the  temperate 
and  the  intemperate,  and  though  the  term  poverty  ceases  to 
be  so  dreadful,  and  no  longer  denotes  want  of  the  natural 
necessaries  of  the  body,  there  will  still  remain  the  relatively 
rich  and  the  relatively  poor. 

But  now  something  can  be  done  directly,  to  remove  the 
causes  of  poverty,  something  to  mitigate  their  effects ;  we 
need  both  the  palliative  charity,  and  the  remedial  justice. 
Tenements  for  the  poor  can  be  provided  at  a  cheap  rent,  that 
shall  yet  pay  their  owner  a  reasonable  income.  This  has 
been  proved  by  actual  experiment,  and,  after  all  that  has 
been  said  about  it,  I  am  amazed  that  no  more  is  done.  I 
will  not  exhort  the  churches  to  this  in  the  name  of  religion  — 
they  have  other  matters  to  attend  to  ;  but  if  capitalists  will 
not,  in  a  place  like  Boston,  it  seems  to  me  the  City  should 
see  that  this  class  of  the  population  is  provided  with  tene- 
ments, at  a  rate  not  ruinous.  It  would  be  good  economy  to 
do  it,  in  the  pecuniary  sense  of  good  economy ;  certainly 
to  hire  money  at  six  per  cent.,  and  rent  the  houses  built 
therewith,  at  eight  per  cent.,  would  cost  less  than  to  sup- 
port the  poor  entirely  in  almshouses,  and  punish  them  in 
jails. 

Something  yet  more  may  be  done,  in  the  way  of  furnish- 
ing them  with  work,  or  of  directing  them  to  it ;  something 
towards  enabling  them  to  purchase  food  and  other  articles 
cheap. 

Something  might  be  done  to  prevent  street  beggary, 
and  begging  from  house  to  house,  which  is  rather  a  new 
thing  in  this  town.  The  indiscriminate  charity,  which  is 
difficult  to  withhold  from  a  needy  and  importunate  beggar, 
does  more  harm  than  good. 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  257 

Much  may  be  done  to  promote  temperance ;  much  more, 
I  fear,  than  is  likely  to  be  done ;  that  is  plainly  the  duty  of 
society.  Intemperance  is  bad  enough  with  the  comfortable 
and  the  rich;  with  the  poor  it  is  ruin  —  sheer,  blank  and 
swift  ruin.  The  example  of  the  rich,  of  the  comfortable, 
goes  down  there  like  lightning,  to  shatter,  to  blast,  and  to 
burn.  It  is  marvellous,  that  in  Christian  Boston,  men  of 
wealth,  and  so  above  the  temptation  which  lurks  behind  a 
dollar,  men  of  character  otherwise  thought  to  be  elevated, 
can  yet  continue  a  traffic  which  leads  to  the  ruin  and  slow 
butchery  of  such  masses  of  men.  I  know  not  what  can  be 
done  by  means  of  the  public  law.  I  do  know  what  can  be 
done  by  private  self-denial,  by  private  diligence. 

Something  also  may  be  done  to  promote  religion  amongst 
the  poor,  at  least  something  to  make  it  practicable  for  a  poor 
man  to  come  to  church  on  Sunday,  with  his  fellow-creatures 
who  are  not  miserable  —  and  to  hear  the  best  things  that  the 
ablest  men  in  the  church  have  to  offer.  We  are  very  demo- 
cratic in  our  State,  not  at  all  so  in  our  church.  In  this  mat- 
ter the  Catholics  put  us  quite  to  shame.  If,  as  some  men  still 
believe,  it  be  a  manly  calling  and  a  noble,  to  preach  Chris- 
tianity, then  to  preach  it  to  men  who  stand  in  the  worst  and 
most  dangerous  positions  in  society ;  to  take  the  highest 
truths  of  human  consciousness,  the  loftiest  philosophy,  the 
noblest  piety,  and  bring  them  down  into  the  daily  life  of  poor 
men,  rude  men,  men  obscure,  unfriended,  ready  to  perish  ; 
surely  this  is  the  noblest  part  of  that  calling,  and  demands 
the  noblest  gifts,  the  fairest  and  the  largest  culture,  the 
loftiest  powers. 

It  is  no  hard  thing  to  reason  with  reasoning  men,  and  be 
intelligible  to  the  intelligent ;  to  talk  acceptably  and  even 
movingly  to  scholars  and  men  well  read,  is  no  hard  thing  if 
you  are  yourself  well  read  and  a  scholar.  But  to  be  intel- 
ligible to  the  ignorant,  to  reason  with  men  who  reason  not, 
to  speak  acceptably  and  movingly  with  such  men,  to  in- 
spiro  them  with  wisdom,  with  goodness  and  with  piety. 
22* 


258  SERMON    OF    POVERTY. 

that  is  the  task  only  for  some  men  of  rare  genius  who  can 
stride  over  the  great  gulf  betwixt  the  thrones  of  creative 
power,  and  the  humble  positions  of  men  ignorant,  poor  and 
forgot !  Yet  such  men  there  are,  and  here  is  their  work. 

Something  can  be  done  for  the  children  of  the  poor  —  to 
promote  their  education,  to  find  them  employment,  to  snatch 
their  little  ones  from  underneath  the  feet  of  that  grim  Pov- 
erty. It  is  not  less  than  awful,  to  think  while  there  are  more 
children  born  in  Boston  of  Catholic  parents  than  of  Protest- 
ant, that  yet  more  than  three  fifths  thereof  die  before  the  sun 
of  their  fifth  year  shines  on  their  luckless  heads.  I  thank 
God  that  thus  they  die.  If  there  be  not  wisdom  enough  in 
society,  nor  enough  of  justice  there  to  save  them  from  their 
future  long-protracted  suffering,  then  I  thank  God  that  Death 
comes  down  betimes,  and  moistens  his  sickle  while  his  crop 
is  green.  I  pity  not  the  miserable  babes  who  fall  early  be- 
fore that  merciful  arm  of  Death.  They  are  at  rest.  Pov- 
erty cannot  touch  them.  Let  the  mothers  who  bore  them 
rejoice,  but  weep  only  for  those  that  are  left  —  left  to  igno- 
rance, to  misery,  to  intemperance,  to  vice  that  I  shall  not 
name ;  left  to  the  mercies  of  the  jail,  and  perhaps  the  gal- 
lows at  the  last.  Yet  Boston  is  a  Christian  city  —  and  it  is 
eighteen  hundred  years  since  one  great  Son  of  Man  came  to 
seek  and  to  save  that  which  was  lost ! 

I  see  not  what  more  can  be  done  directly,  and  I  see  not 
why  these  things  should  not  be  done.  Still  some  will  suf- 
fer :  the  idle,  the  lazy,  the  proud  who  will  not  work,  the 
careless  who  will  voluntarily  waste  their  time,  their  strength, 
or  their  goods  —  they  must  suffer,  they  ought  to  suffer. 
Want  is  the  only  schoolmaster  to  teach  them  industry  and 
thrift.  Such  as  are  merely  unable,  who  are  poor  not  by 
their  fault  —  we  do  wrong  to  let  them  suffer  ;  we  do  wick- 
edly to  leave  them  to  perish.  The  little  children  who  sur- 
vive —  are  they  to  be  left  to  become  barbarians  in  the  midst 
of  our  civilization  ? 

Want  is  not  an  absolutely  needful  thing,  but  very  needful 


SERMON    OF    POVERTY.  259 

for  the  present  distress,  to  teach  us  industry,  economy,  thrift 
and  its  creative  arts.  There  is  nature  —  the  whole  material 
world  —  waiting  to  serve.  "  What  would  you  have  thereof?  " 
says  God.  "  Pay  for  it  and  take  it,  as  you  will ;  only 
pay  as  you  go ! "  There  are  hands  to  work,  heads  to  think  ; 
strong  hands,  hard  heads.  God  is  an  economist :  He  econo- 
mizes suffering ;  there  is  never  too  much  of  it  in  the  world 
for  the  purpose  it  is  to  servev  though  it  often  falls  where  it 
should  not  fall.  It  is  here  to  teach  us  industry,  thrift, 
justice.  It  will  be  here  no  more  when  we  have  learned  its 
lesson.  Want  is  here  on  sufferance  ;  misery  on  sufferance  ; 
and  mankind  can  eject  them  if  we  will.  Poverty,  like  all 
evils,  is  amenable  to  suppression. 

Can  we  not  end  this  poverty  —  the  misery  and  crime  it 
brings  ?  No,  not  to-day.  Can  we  not  lessen  jj  ?  Soon  as 
we  will.  Think  how  much  ability  there  is  in  ihis  town, 
cool,  far-sighted  talent.  If  some  of  the  ablest  men  directed 
their  thoughts  to  the  reform  of  this  evil,  how  much  might  be 
done  in  a  single  generation  ;  and  in  a  century  —  what  could 
not  they  do  in  a  hundred  years  ?  What  better  work  is  there 
for  able  men  ?  I  would  have  it  written  on  my  tombstone  : 
"This  man  had  but  little  wit,  and  less  fame,  yet  he  helped 
remove  the  causes  of  poverty,  making  men  better  off  and 
better,"  rather  by  far  than  this  :  "  Here  lies  a  great  man ; 
he  had  a  great  place  in  the  world,  and  great  power,  and 
great  fame,  and  made  nothing  of  it,  leaving  the  world  no 
better  for  his  stay  therein,  and  no  man  better  off." 

After  all  the  special  efforts  to  remove  poverty,  the  great 
work  is  to  be  done  by  the  general  advance  of  mankind. 
We  shall  outgrow  this  as  cannibalism,  butchery  of  captives, 
war  for  plunder,  and  other  kindred  miseries  have  been  out- 
grown. God  has  general  remedies  in  abundance,  but  few 
specific.  Something  will  be  done  by  diffusing  throughout 
the  community  principles  and  habits  of  economy,  indilstry, 
temperance ;  by  diffusing  ideas  of  justice,  sentiments  of 


260  SERMON    OF    POVERTY. 

brotherly  love,  sentiments  and  ideas  of  religion.  I  hope 
every  thing  from  that  —  the  noiseless  and  steady  progress  of 
Christianity  ;  the  snow  melts,  not  by  sun-light,  or  that  alone, 
but  as  the  whole  air  becomes  warm.  You  may  in  cold 
weather  melt  away  a  little  before  your  own  door,  but  that 
makes  little  difference  till  the  general  temperature  rises. 
Still  while  the  air  is  getting  warm,  you  facilitate  the  process 
by  breaking  up  the  obdurate  masses  of  ice  and  putting  them 
where  the  sun  shines  with  direct  and  unimpeded  light.  So 
must  we  do  with  poverty. 

It  is  only  a  little  that  any  of  us  can  do  —  for  any  thing. 
Still  we  can  do  a  little ;  we  can  each  do  something  towards 
raising  the  general  tone  of  society :  first,  by  each  man  raising 
himself;  by  industry,  economy,  charity,  justice,  piety;  by 
a  noble  life.  So  doing,  we  raise  the  moral  temperature  of 
the  whole  world,  and  just  in  proportion  thereto.  Next,  by 
helping  those  who  come  in  our  way  ;  nay,  by  going  out  of 
our  way  to  help  them.  In  each  of  these  modes,  it  is  our 
duty  to  work.  To  a  certain  extent  each  man  is  his  brother's 
keeper.  Of  the  powers  we  possess  we  are  but  trustees 
under  Providence,  to  use  them  for  the  benefit  of  men,  and 
render  continually  an  account  of  our  stewardship  to  God. 
Each  man  can  do  a  little  directly  to  help  convince  the  world 
of  its  wrong,  a  little  in  the  way  of  temporizing  charity,  a 
little  in  the  way  of  remedial  justice  ;  so  doing,  he  works 
with  God,  and  God  works  with  him. 


X. 


A    SERMON    OP    THE    MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.      PREACHED    AT 
THE  MELODEON,  ON  SUNDAY,  FEBRUARY   11,   1849. 


I    SAMUEL    VII.    12. 
HITHERTO     HATH     THE     LORD     HELPED    CS. 

A  MAN  who  has  only  the  spirit  of  his  age  can  easily  be  a 
popular  man ;  if  he  have  it  in  an  eminent  degree,  he  must 
be  a  popular  man  in  it :  he  has  its  hopes  and  its  fears  ;  his 
trumpet  gives  a  certain  and  well  known  sound  ;  his  counsel 
is  readily  appreciated  ;  the  majority  is  on  his  side.  But  he 
cannot  be  a  wise  magistrate,  a  just  judge,  a  competent  critic, 
or  a  profitable  preacher.  A  man  who  has  only  the  spirit 
of  a  former  age  can  be  none  of  these  four  things  ;  and  not 
even  a  popular  man.  He  remembers  when  he  ought  to 
forecast,  and  compares  when  he  ought  to  act ;  he  cannot 
appreciate  the  age  he  lives  in,  nor  have  a  fellow-feeling 
with  it.  He  may  easily  obtain  the  pity  of  his  age,  not  its 
sympathy  or  its  confidence.  The  man  who  has  the  spirit  of 
his  own,  and  also  that  of  some  future  age,  is  alone  capable 
of  becoming  a  wise  magistrate,  a  just  judge,  a  competent 
critic,  and  a  profitable  preacher.  Such  a  man  looks  on 
passing  events  somewhat  as  the  future  historian  will  do,  and 
sees  them  in  their  proportions,  not  distorted  ;  sees  them  in 
their  connection  with  great  general  laws,  and  judges  of  the 
falling  rain  not  merely  by  the  bonnets  it  may  spoil  and  the 


262  SERMON    OF    THE 

pastime  it  disturbs,  but  by  the  grass  and  corn  it  shall  cause 
to  grow.  He  has  hopes  and  fears  of  his  own,  but  they  are 
not  the  hopes  and  fears  of  men  about  him  ;  his  trumpet  can- 
not give  a  welcome  or  well  known  sound,  nor  his  counsel 
be  presently  heeded.  Majorities  are  not  on  his  side,  nor 
can  he  be  a  popular  man. 

To  understand  our  present  moral  condition,  to  be  able  to 
give  good  counsel  thereon,  you  must  understand  the  former 
generation,  and  have  potentially  the  spirit  of  the  future  gen- 
eration ;  must  appreciate  the  past,  and  yet  belong  to  the 
future.  Who  is  there  that  can  do  this  ?  No  man  will  say, 
"  I  can."  Conscious  of  the  difficulty,  and  aware  of  my  own 
deficiencies  in  all  these  respects,  I  will  yet  endeavor  to 
speak  of  the  moral  condition  of  Boston. 

First,  I  will  speak  of  the  actual  moral  condition  of  Boston, 
as  indicated  by  the  morals  of  Trade.  In  a  city  like  Rome, 
you  must  first  feel  the  pulse  of  the  church,  in  St.  Peters- 
burg that  of  the  court,  to  determine  the  moral  condition  of 
those  cities.  Now  trade  is  to  Boston  what  the  church  is 
to  Rome  and  the  imperial  court  to  St.  Petersburg :  it  is 
the  pendulum  which  regulates  all  the  common  and  authoriz- 
ed machinery  of  the  place  ;  it  is  an  organization  of  the  pub- 
lic conscience.  We  care  little  for  any  Pius  the  Ninth,  or 
Nicholas  the  First ;  the  dollar  is  our  emperor  and  pope, 
above  all  the  parties  in  the  State,  all  sects  in  the  church, 
lord  paramount  over  both,  its  spiritual  and  temporal  power 
not  likely  to  be  called  in  question  ;  revolt  from  what  else  we 
may,  we  are  loyal  still  to  that. 

A  little  while  ago,  in  a  sermon  of  riches,  speaking  of  the 
character  of  trade  in  Boston,  I  suggested  that  men  were  bet- 
ter than  their  reputation  oftener  than  worse  ;  that  there  were 
a  hundred  honest  bargains  to  one  that  was  dishonest.  I 
have  heard  severe  strictures  from  friendly  tongues,  on  that 
statement,  which  gave  me  more  pain  than  any  criticism  I 
have  received  before.  The  criticism  was,  that  I  overrated 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  263 

the  honesty  of  men  in  trade.  Now,  it  is  a  small  thing  to  be 
convicted  of  an  error  —  a  just  thing  and  a  profitable  to  have 
it  detected  and  exposed  ;  but  it  is  a  painful  thing  to  find  you 
have  overrated  the  moral  character  of  your  townsmen. 
However,  if  what  I  said  be  not  true  as  history,  I  hope  it  will 
become  so  as  prophecy ;  I  doubt  not  my  critics  will  help 
that  work. 

Love  of  money  is  out  of  proportion  to  love  of  better 
things  —  to  love  of  justice,  of  truth,  of  a  manly  character 
developing  itself  in  a  manly  life.  Wealth  is  often  made  the 
end  to  live  for ;  not  the  means  to  live  by,  and  attain  a  manly 
character.  The  young  man  of  good  abilities  does  not  com- 
monly propose  it  to  himself  to  be  a  noble  man,  equipped 
with  all  the  intellectual  and  moral  qualities  which  belong  to 
that,  and  capable  of  the  duties  which  come  thereof.  He  is 
satisfied  if  he  can  become  a  rich  man.  It  is  the  highest 
ambition  of  many  a  youth  in  this  town  to  become  one  of  the 
rich  men  of  Boston ;  to  have  the  social  position  which 
wealth  always  gives,  and  nothing  else  in  this  country  can 
commonly  bestow.  Accordingly,  our  young  men  that  are 
now  poor,  will  sacrifice  every  thing  to  this  one  object ;  will 
make  wealth  the  end,  and  will  become  rich  without  be- 
coming noble.  But  wealth  without  nobleness  of  character 
is  always  vulgar.  I  have  seen  a  clown  staring  at  himself  in 
the  gorgeous  mirror  of  a  French  palace,  and  thought  him  no 
bad  emblem  of  many  an  ignoble  man  at  home,  surrounded 
by  material  riches  which  only  reflected  back  the  vulgarity 
of  their  owner. 

Other  young  men  inherit  wealth,  but  seldom  regard  it 
as  a  means  of  power  for  high  and  noble  ends,  only  as  the 
means  of  selfish  indulgence  ;  unneeded  means  to  elevate 
yet  more  their  self-esteem.  Now  and  then  you  find  a  man 
who  values  wealth  only  as  an  instrument  to  serve  mankind 
withal.  I  know  some  such  men  ;  their  money  is  a  blessing 
akin  to  genius,  a  blessing  to  mankind,  a  means  of  philan- 
thropic power.  But  such  men  are  rare  in  all  countries, 


264  SERMON    OF    THE 

perhaps  a  little  less  so  in  Boston  than  in  most  other  large 
trading  towns ;  still,  exceeding  rare.  They  are  sure  to 
meet  with  neglect,  abuse,  and  perhaps  with  scorn  ;  if  they 
are  men  of  eminent  ability,  superior  culture,  and  most  ele- 
vated moral  aims,  set  off,  too,  with  a  noble  and  heroic  life, 
they  are  sure  of  meeting  with  eminent  hatred.  I  fear  the 
man  most  hated  in  this  town  would  be  found  to  be  some 
one  who  had  only  sought  to  do  mankind  some  great  good, 
and  stepped  before  his  age  too  far  for  its  sympathy.  Truth, 
Justice,  Humanity,  are  not  thought  in  Boston  to  have  come 
of  good  family  ;  their  followers  are  not  respectable.  I  am 
not  speaking  to  blame  men,  only  to  show  the  fact ;  we  may 
meddle  with  things  too  high  for  us,  but  not  understand  nor 
appreciate. 

Now  this  disproportionate  love  of  money  appears  in  va- 
rious ways.  You  see  it  in  the  advantage  that  is  taken  of 
the  feeblest,  the  most  ignorant,  and  the  most  exposed  classes 
in  the  community.  It  is  notorious  that  they  pay  the  highest 
prices,  the  dearest  rents,  and  are  imposed  upon  in  their 
dealings  oftener  than  any  other  class  of  men  ;  so  the  raven 
and  the  hooded  crow,  it  is  said,  seek  out  the  sickliest  sheep 
to  pounce  upon.  The  fact  that  a  man  is  ignorant,  poor, 
and  desperate,  furnishes  to  many  men  an  argument  for 
defrauding  the  man.  It  is  bad  enough  to  injure  any  man  ; 
but  to  wrong  an  ignorant  man,  a  poor  and  friendless  man  ; 
to  take  advantage  of  his  poverty  or  his  ignorance,  and  to  get 
his  services  or  his  money  for  less  than  a  fair  return  —  that 
is  petty  baseness  under  aggravated  circumstances,  and  as 
cowardly  as  it  is  mean.  You  are  now  and  then  shocked  at 
rich  men  telling  of  the  arts  by  which  they  got  their  gold  — 
sometimes  of  their  fraud  at  home,  sometimes  abroad,  and  a 
good  man  almost  thinks  there  must  be  a  curse  on  money 
meanly  got  at  first,  though  it  falls  to  him  by  honest  inher- 
itance. 

This  same  disproportionate  love  of  money  appears  in  the 
fact  that  men,  not  driven  by  necessity,  engage  in  the  manu- 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  265 

facture,  the  importation,  and  the  sale  of  an  article  which  cor- 
rupts and  ruins  men  by  hundreds ;  which  has  done  more  to 
increase  poverty,  misery,  and  crime  than  any  other  one  cause 
whatever ;  and,  as  some  think,  more  than  all  other  causes 
whatever.  I  am  not  speaking  of  men  who  aid  in  any  just 
and  proper  use  of  that  article,  but  in  its  ruinous  use.  Yet 
such  men,  by  such  a  traffic,  never  lose  their  standing  in  so- 
ciety, their  reputation  in  trade,  their  character  in  the  church. 
A  good  many  men  will  think  worse  of  you  for  being  an 
Abolitionist;  men  have  lost  their  place  in  society  by  that 
name  ;  even  Dr.  Channing  "  hurt  his  usefulness  "  and  "  in- 
jured his  reputation  "  by  daring  to  speak  against  that  sin  of 
the  nation  ;  but  no  man  loses  caste  in  Boston  by  making, 
importing,  and  selling  the  cause  of  ruin  to  hundreds  of 
families — though  he  does  it  with  his  eyes  open,  knowing 
that  he  ministers  to  crime  and  to  ruin !  I  am  told  that  large 
quantities  of  New  England  rum  have  already  been  sent 
from  this  city  to  California  ;  it  is  notorious  that  much  of  it 
is  sent  to  the  nations  of  Africa  —  if  not  from  Boston,  at 
least  from  New  England  —  as  an  auxiliary  in  the  slave 
trade.  You  know  with  what  feelings  of  grief  and  indigna- 
tion a  clergyman  of  this  city  saw  that  characteristic  manu- 
facture of  his  town  on  the  wharves  of  a  Mahometan  city. 
I  suppose  there  are  not  ten  ministers  in  Boston  who  would 
not  "  get  into  trouble,"  as  the  phrase  is,  if  they  were  to 
preach  against  intemperance,  and  the  causes  that  produce 
intemperance,  with  half  so  much  zeal  as  they  innocently 
preach  "  regeneration  "  and  a  "  form  of  piety  "  which  will 
never  touch  a  single  corner  of  the  earth.  As  the  minister 
came  down,  the  Spirit  of  Trade  would  meet  him  on  the  pul- 
pit stairs  to  warn  him  :  "  business  is  business ;  religion  is 
religion.  Business  is  ours,  religion  yours  ;  but  if  you  make 
or  even  allow  religion  to  interfere  with  our  business,  then  it 
will  be  the  worse  for  you  —  that  is  all !  "  You  know  it  is 
not  a  great  while  since  we  drove  out  of  Boston  the  one  Uni- 
23 


266  SERMON    OF    THE 

tarian  minister  who  was  a  fearless  apostle  of  temperance.* 
His  presence  here  was  a  grief  to  that  "  form  of  piety  ;"  a 
disturbance  to  trade.  Since  then  the  peace  of  the  churches 
has  not  been  much  disturbed  by  the  preaching  of  tempe- 
rance. The  effect  has  been  salutary  :  no  Unitarian  minister 
has  risen  up  to  fill  that  place  ! 

This  same  disproportionate  love  of  money  appears  in 
the  fact,  that  the  merchants  of  Boston  still  allow  colored 
seamen  to  be  taken  from  their  ships  and  shut  up  in  the 
jails  of  another  State.  If  they  cared  as  much  for  the  rights 
of  man  as  for  money,  as  much  for  the  men  who  sail  the 
ship  as  for  the  cargo  it  carries,  I  cannot  think  there  would 
be  brass  enough  in  South  Carolina,  or  all  the  South,  to  hold 
another  freeman  of  Massachusetts  in  bondage,  merely  for 
the  color  of  his  skin.  No  doubt,  a  merchant  would  lose 
his  reputation  in  this  city  by  engaging  directly  in  the  slave- 
trade,  for  it  is  made  piracy  by  the  law  of  the  land.t  But 
did  any  one  ever  lose  his  reputation  by  taking  a  mortgage 
on  slaves  as  security  for  a  debt ;  by  becoming,  in  that  way 
or  by  inheritance,  the  owner  of  slaves,  and  still  keeping 
them  in  bondage  ? 

You  shall  take  the  whole  trading  community  of  Boston, 
rich  and  poor,  good  and  bad,  study  the  phenomena  of 
trade  as  astronomers  the  phenomena  of  the  heavens,  and 
from  the  observed  facts,  by  the  inductive  method  of  phi- 
losophy, construct  the  ethics  of  trade,  and  you  will  find  one 
great  maxim  to  underlie  the  whole  :  Money  must  be  made. 
Money-making  is  to  the  ethics  of  trade  what  attraction  is  to 

*  Rev.  John  Pierpont. 

t  This  statement  was  made  in  1849 ;  subsequent  events  have 
shown  that  I  was  mistaken.  It  is  now  thought  respectable  and  patriotic 
not  only  to  engage  in  the  slave-trade,  but  to  kidnap  men  and  women 
in  Boston.  Most  of  the  prominent  newspapers,  and  several  of  the 
most  prominent  clergy,  defend  the  kidnapping.  Attempts  have  re- 
peatedly been  made  to  kidnap  my  own  parishioners.  Kidnapping 
is  not  even  a  matter  of  church  discipline  in  Boston  in  1851. 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  267 

the  material  world  ;  what  truth  is  to  the  intellect,  and  justice 
in  morals.  Other  things  must  yield  to  that ;  that  to  nothing. 
In  the  effort  to  comply  with  this  universal  law  of  trade, 
many  a  character  gives  way ;  many  a  virtue  gets  pushed 
aside ;  the  higher,  nobler  qualities  of  a  man  are  held  in 
small  esteem. 

This  characteristic  of  the  trading  class  appears  in  the 
thought  of  the  people  as  well  as  their  actions.  You  see  it 
in  the  secular  literature  of  our  times;  in  the  laws,  even  in 
the  sermons ;  nobler  things  give  way  to  love  of  gold.  So 
in  an  ill-tended  garden,  in  some  bed  where  violets  sought 
to  open  their  fragrant  bosoms  to  the  sun,  have  I  seen  a 
cabbage  come  up  and  grow  apace,  with  thick  and  vulgar 
stalk,  with  coarse  and  vulgar  leaves,  with  rank  unsavory 
look ;  it  thrust  aside  the  little  violet,  which,  underneath  that 
impenetrable  leaf,  lacking  the  morning  sunshine  and  the 
dew  of  night,  faded  and  gave  up  its  tender  life ;  but  above 
the  grave  of  the  violet  there  stood  the  cabbage,  green, 
expanding,  triumphant,  and  all  fearless  of  the  frost.  Yet 
the  cabbage  also  had  its  value  and  its  use. 

There  are  men  in  Boston,  some  rich,  some  poor,  old  and 
young,  who  are  free  from  this  reproach ;  men  that  have  a 
well-proportioned  love  of  money,  and  make  the  pursuit 
thereof  an  effort  for  all  the  noble  qualities  of  a  man.  I 
know  some  such  men,  not  very  numerous  any  where,  men 
who  show  that  the  common  business  of  life  is  the  place  to 
mature  great  virtues  in  ;  that  the  pursuit  of  wealth,  success- 
ful or  not,  need  hinder  the  growth  of  no  excellence,  but 
may  promote  all  manly  life.  Such  men  stand  here  as 
violets  among  the  cabbages,  making  a  fragrance  and  a  love- 
liness all  their  own ;  attractive  any  where,  but  marvellous 
in  such  a  neighborhood  as  that. 

Look  next  on  the  morals  of  Boston,  as  indicated  by  the 
Newspapers,  the  daily  and  the  weekly  press.  Take  the 
whole  newspaper  literature  of  Boston,  cheap  and  costly, 


268  SERMON    OF    THE 

good  and  bad,  study  it  all  as  a  whole,  and  by  the  inductive 
method  construct  the  ethics  of  the  press,  and  here  you  find 
no  signs  of  a  higher  morality  in  general  than  you  found  in 
trade.  It  is  the  same  centre  about  which  all  things  gravi- 
tate here  as  there.  But  in  the  newspapers  the  want  of 
great  principles  is  more  obvious,  and  more  severely  felt 
than  in  trade  —  the  want  of  justice,  of  truth,  of  humanity, 
of  sympathy  with  man.  In  trade  you  meet  with  signs  of 
great  power ;  the  highway  of  commerce  bears  marks  of 
giant  feet.  Our  newspapers  seem  chiefly  in  the  hands  of 
little  men,  whose  cunning  is  in  a  large  ratio  to  their  wisdom 
or  their  justice.  You  find  here  little  ability,  little  sound 
learning,  little  wise  political  economy ;  of  lofty  morals 
almost  nothing  at  all.  Here,  also,  the  dollar  is  both  Pope 
and  King ;  right  and  truth  are  vassals,  not  much  esteemed, 
nor  over-often  called  to  pay  service  to  their  Lord,  who  has 
other  soldiers  with  more  pliant  neck  and  knee. 

A  newspaper  is  an  instrument  of  great  importance ;  all 
men  read  it ;  many  read  nothing  else  ;  some  it  serves  as 
reason  and  conscience  too  :  in  lack  of  better,  why  not  ?  It 
speaks  to  thousands  every  day  on  matters  of  great  moment 
—  on  matters  of  morals,  of  politics,  of  finance.  It  relates 
daily  the  occurrences  of  our  land,  and  of  all  the  world. 
All  men  are  affected  by  it ;  hindered  or  helped.  To  many 
a  man  his  morning  paper  represents  more  reality  than  his 
morning  prayer.  There  are  many  in  a  community  like 
this  who  do  not  know  what  to  say  —  I  do  not  mean  what  to 
think,  thoughtful  men  know  what  to  think  —  about  any 
thing  till  somebody  tells  them ;  yet  they  must  talk,  for 
"  the  mouth  goes  always."  To  such  a  man  a  newspaper 
is  invaluable  ;  as  the  idolater  in  the  Judges  had  "  a  Levite 
to  his  priest,"  so  he  has  a  newspaper  to  his  reason  or  his 
conscience,  and  can  talk  to  the  day's  end.  An  able  and 
humane  newspaper  would  get  this  class  of  persons  into 
good  habits  of  speech,  and  do  them  a  service,  inasmuch  as 
good  habits  of  speech  are  better  than  bad. 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  269 

One  portion  of  this  literature  is  degrading ;  it  seems 
purposely  so,  as  if  written  by  base  men,  for  base  readers, 
to  serve  base  ends.  I  know  not  wbich  is-  most  depraved 
thereby,  the  taste  or  the  conscience.  Obscene  advertise- 
ments are  there,r  meant  for  the  licentious  eye ;  there  are 
loathsome  details  of  vice,  of  crime,  of  depravity,  related 
I  with  the  design  to  attract,  yet  so  disgusting  that  any  but  a 
corrupt  man  must  revolt  from  them  ;  there  are  accounts  of 
the  appearance  of  culprits  in  the  lower  courts,  of  their 
crime,  of  their  punishment ;  these  are  related  with  an  impu- 
dent flippancy,  and  a  desire  to  make  sport  of  human 
wretchedness  and  perhaps  depravity,  which  amaze  a  man 
of  only  the  average  humanity.  We  read  of  Judge  Jeffreys 
and  the  bloody  assizes  in  England,  one  hundred  and  sixty 
years  ago,  but  never  think  there  are  in  the  midst  of  us'men 
who,  like  that  monster,  can  make  sport  of  human  misery ; 
but  for  a  cent  you  can  find  proof  that  the  race  of  such  is 
not  extinct.  If  a  penny-a-liner  were  to  go  into  a  military 
hospital,  and  make  merry  at  the  sights  he  saw  there,  at  the 
groans  he  heard,  and  the  keen  smart  his  eye  witnessed, 
could  he  publish  his  fiendish  joy  at  that  spectacle  —  you 
would  not  say  he  was  a  man.  If  one  mock  at  the  crimes 
of  men,  perhaps  at  their  sins,  at  the  infamous  punishments 
they  suffer  —  what  can  you  say  of  him? 

It  is  a  significant  fact  that  the  commercial  newspapers, 
which  of  course  in  such  a  town  are  the  controlling  news- 
papers, in  reporting  the  European  news,  relate  first  the 
state  of  the  markets  abroad,  the  price  of  cotton,  of  con- 
sols, and  of  corn ;  then  the  health  of  the  English  queen, 
and  the  movements  of  the  nations.  This  is  loyal  and 
consistent ;  at  Rome,  the  journal  used  to  announce  first 
some  tidings  of  the  Pope,  then  of  the  lesser  dignitaries  of 
the  church,  then  of  the  discovery  of  new  antiques,  and 
other  matters  of  great  pith  and  moment ;  at  St.  Petersburg, 
it  was  first  of  the  Emperor  that  the  journal  spoke  ;  at  Bos- 
23* 


270  SERMON    OF    THE 

ton,  it  is  legitimate  that  the  health  of  the  dollar  should  be 
reported  first  of  all.  • 

The  political  newspapers  are  a  melancholy  proof  of  the 
low  morality  of  this  town.  You  know  what  they  will  say  of 
any  party  movement ;  that  measures  and  men  are  judged  on 
purely  party  grounds.  The  country  is  commonly  put  before 
mankind,  and  the  party  before  the  country.  Which  of  them 
in  political  matters  pursues  a  course  that  is  fair  and  just ; 
how  many  of  them  have  ever  advanced  a  great  idea,  or  been 
constantly  true  to  a  great  principle  of  natural  justice  ;  how 
many  resolutely  oppose  a  great  wrong ;  how  many  can  be 
trusted  to  expose  the  most  notorious  blunders  of  their  party ; 
how  many  of  them  aim  to  promote  the  higher  interests  of 
mankind  ?  What  servility  is  there  in  some  of  these  journals, 
a  cringing  to  the  public  opinion  of  the  party  ;  a  desire  that 
"  our  efforts  may  be  appreciated  !  "  In  our  politics  every 
thing  which  relates  to  money  is  pretty  carefully  looked  after, 
though  not  always  well  looked  after ;  but  what  relates  to  the 
moral  part  of  politics  is  commonly  passed  over  with  much 
less  heed.  Men  would  compliment  a  senator  who  under- 
stood finance  in  all  its  mysteries,  and  sneer  at  one  who  had 
studied  as  faithfully  the  mysteries  of  war,  or  of  slavery. 
The  Mexican  War  tested  the  morality  of  Boston,  as  it 
appears  both  in  the  newspapers  and  in  trade,  and  showed  its 
true  value. 

There  are  some  few  exceptions  to  this  statement ;  here 
and  there  is  a  journal  which  does  set  forth  the  great  ideas  of 
this  age,  and  is  animated  by  the  spirit  of  humanity.  But 
such  exceptions  only  remind  one  of  the  general  rule. 

In  the  sectarian  journals  the  same  general  morality  ap- 
pears, but  in  a  worse  form.  What  would  have  been  political 
hatred  in  the  secular  prints,  becomes  theological  odium  in  the 
sectarian  journals ;  not  a  mere  hatred  in  the  name  of  party, 
but  hatred  in  the  name  of  God  and  Christ.  .  Here  is  less 
fairness,  less  openness,  and  less  ability  than  there,  but  more 
malice  ;  the  form,  too,  is  less  manly.  What  is  there  a  strut 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  271 

or  a  swagger,  is  here  only  a  snivel.  They  are  the  last  places 
in  which  you  need  look  for  the  spirit  of  true  morality. 
Which  of  the  sectarian  journals  of  Boston  advocates  any  of 
the  great  reforms  of  the  day  ?  nay,  which  is  not  an  obstacle 
in  the  path  of  all  manly  reform  ?  But  let  us  not  dwell  upon 
this,  only  look  and  pass  by. 

I  am  not  about  to  censure  the  conductors  of  these  journals, 
commercial,  political,  or  theological.  I  am  no  judge  of  any 
man's  conscience.  No  doubt  they  write  as  they  can  or  must. 
This  literature  is  as  honest  and  as  able  as  "  the  circumstances 
will  admit  of."  I  look  on  it  as  an  index  of  our  moral  con- 
dition, for  a  newspaper  literature  always  represents  the 
general  morals  of  its  readers.  Grocers  and  butchers  pur- 
chase only  such  articles  as  their  customers  will  buy ;  the 
editors  of  newspapers  reveal  the  moral  character  of  their 
subscribers  as  well  as  their  correspondents.  The  transient 
literature  of  any  age  is  always  a  good  index  of  the  moral 
taste  of  the  age.  These  two  witnesses  attest  the  moral 
condition  of  the  better  part  of  the  city  ;  but  there  are  men  a 
good  deal  lower  than  the  general  morals  of  trade  and  the 
press.  Other  witnesses  testify  to  their  moral  character. 

Let  me  now  speak  of  your  moral  condition  as  indicated 
by  the  Poverty  in  this  city.  I  have  so  recently  spoken  on 
the  subject  of  poverty  in  Boston,  and  printed  the  sermon, 
that  I  will  not  now  mention  the  misery  it  brings.  I  will  only 
speak  of  the  moral  condition  which  it  indicates,  and  the 
moral  effect  it  has  upon  us. 

In  this  age,  poverty  tends  to  barbarize  men ;  it  shuts  them 
out  from  the  educational  influences  of  our  times.  The  sons 
of  the  miserable  class  cannot  obtain  the  intellectual,  moral, 
and  religious  education  which  is  the  birthright  of  the 
comfortable  and  the  rich.  There  is  a  great  gulf  between 
them  and  the  culture  of  our  times.  How  hard  it  must  be  to 
climb  up  from  a  cellar  in  Cove  Place  to  wisdom,  to  honesty, 
to  piety.  I  know  how  comfortable  pharisaic  self-righteous- 


272  SERMON    OF    THE 

ness  can  say,  "I  thank  thee  I  am  not  wicked  like  one  of 
these,"  and  God  knows  which  is  the  best  before  His  eyes, 
the  scorner,  or  the  man  he  loathes  and  leaves  to  dirt  and 
destruction.  I  know  this  poverty  belongs  to  the  state  of 
transition  we  are  now  in,  and  can  only  be  ended  by  our 
passing  through  this  into  a  better.  I  see  the  medicinal  effect 
of  poverty,  that  with  cantharidian  sting  it  drives  some  men 
to  work,  to  frugality  and  thrift ;  that  the  Irish  has  driven  the 
American  beggar  out  of  the  streets,  and  will  shame  him  out 
of  the  almshouse  ere  long.  But  there  are  men  who  have 
not  force  enough  to  obey  this  stimulus ;  they  only  cringe 
and  smart  under  its  sting.  Such  men  are  made  barbarians 
by  poverty,  barbarians  in  body,  in  mind  and  conscience,  in 
heart  and  soul.  There  is  a  great  amount  of  this  barbarism 
in  Boston  ;  it  lowers  the  moral  character  of  the  place,  as  ice- 
bergs in  your  harbor  next  June  would  chill  the  air  all  day. 
The  fact  that  such  poverty  is  here,  that  so  little  is  done  by 
public  authority,  or  by  the  ablest  men  in  the  land,  to  remove 
the  evil  tree  and  dig  up  its  evil  root;  that  amid  all  the  wealth 
of  Boston  and  all  its  charity,  there  are  not  even  comfortable 
tenements  for  the  poor  to  be  had  at  any  but  a  ruinous  rent  — 
that  is  a  sad  fact,  and  bears  a  sad  testimony  to  our  moral 
state !  Sometimes  the  spectacle  of  misery  does  good, 
quickening  the  moral  sense  and  touching  the  electric  tie 
which  binds  all  human  hearts  into  one  great  family  ;  but 
when  it  does  not  lead  to  this  result,  then  it  debases  the  looker- 
on.  To  know  of  want,  of  misery,  of  all  the  complicated  and 
far-extended  ill  they  bring ;  to  hear  of  this,  and  to  see  it  in 
the  streets ;  to  have  the  money  to  alleviate,  and  yet  not  to 
alleviate  ;  the  wisdom  to  devise  a  cure  therefor,  and  yet  make 
no  efforts  towards  it  —  that  is  to  be  yourself  debased  and 
barbarized.  I  have  often  thought,  in  seeing  the  poverty  of 
London,  that  the  daily  spectacle  of  such  misery  did  more  in 
a  year  to  debauch  the  British  heart  than  all  the  slaughter  at 
Waterloo.  I  know  that  misery  has  called  out  heroic  virtue 
in  some  men  and  women,  and  made  philanthropists  of  such 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  273 

as  otherwise  had  been  only  getters  and  keepers  of  gain. 
We  have  noble  examples  of  that  in  the  midst  of  us;  but  how 
many  men  has  poverty  trod  down  into  the  mire  ;  how  many 
has  this  sight  of  misery  hardened  into  cold  worldliness,  the 
man  frozen  into  mere  respectability,  its  thin  smile  on  his 
lips,  its  ungodly  contempt  in  his  heart ! 

Out  of  this  barbarism  of  poverty  there  come  three  other 
forms  of  evil  which  indicate  the  moral  condition  of  Boston  ; 
of  that  portion  named  just  now  as  below  the  morals  of  trade 
and  the  press.  These  also  I  will  call  up  to  testify. 

One  is  Intemperance.  This  is  a  crime  against  the  body  ; 
it  is  felony  against  your  own  frame.  It  makes  a  schism 
amongst  your  own  members.  The  amount  of  it  is  fearfully 
great  in  this  town.  Some  of  our  most  wealthy  citizens,  who 
rent  their  buildings  for  the  unlawful  sale  of  rum  to  be 
applied  to  an  intemperate  abuse,  are  directly  concerned  in 
promoting  this  intemperance ;  others,  rich  but  less  wealthy, 
have  sucked  their  abundance  out  of  the  bones  of  the  poor, 
and  are  actual  manufacturers  of  the  drunkard  and  the  crim- 
inal. Here  are  numerous  distilleries  owned,  and  some  of 
them  conducted,  I  am  told,  by  men  of  wealth.  The  fire 
thereof  is  not  quenched  at  all  by  day,  and  there  is  no  night 
there  ;  the  worm  dieth  not.  There  out  of  the  sweetest  plant 
which  God  has  made  to  grow  under  a  tropic  sun,  men  distil 
a  poison  the  most  baneful  to  mankind  which  the  world  has 
ever  known.  The  poison  of  the  Borgias  was  celebrated 
once  ;  cold-hearted  courtiers  shivered  at  its  name.  It  never 
killed  many ;  those  with  merciful  swiftness.  The  poison  of 
rum  is  yet  worse  ;  it  yearly  murders  thousands  ;  kills  them 
by  inches,  body  and  soul.  Here  are  respectable  and  wealthy 
men,  men  who  this  day  sit  down  in  a  Christian  church  and 
thank  God  for  his  goodness,  with  contrite  hearts  praise  him 
for  that  Son  of  Man  who  gave  his  life  for  mankind,  and 
would  gladly  give  it  to  mankind  ;  yet  these  men  have  ships 


274  SERMON    OF    THE 

on  the  sea  to  bring  the  poor  man's  poison  here,  or  bear  it 
hence  to  other  men  as  poor ;  have  distilleries  on  the  land  to 
make  still  yet  more  for  the  ruin  of  their  fellow  Christians ; 
have  warehouses  full  of  this  plague,  which  "  outvenoms  all 
the  worms  of  Nile ; "  have  shops  which  they  rent  for  the 
illegal  and  murderous  sale  of  this  terrible  scourge.  Do  they 
not  know  the  ruin  which  they  work  ;  are  they  the  only  men 
in  the  land  who  have  not  heard  of  the  effects  of  intem- 
perance ?  I  judge  them  not,  great  God !  I  only  judge 
myself.  I  wish  I  could  say,  "They  know  not  what  they 
do ; "  but  at  this  day  who  does  not  know  the  effect  of  intem- 
perance in  Boston  ? 

I  speak  not  of  the  sale  of  ardent  spirits  to  be  used  in  the 
arts,  to  be  used  for  medicine,  but  of  the  needless  use  there- 
of; of  their  use  to  damage  the  body  and  injure  the  soul  of 
man.  The  chief  of  your  police  informs  me  there  are  twelve 
hundred  places  in  Boston,  where  this  article  is  sold  to  be 
drunk  on  the  spot ;  illegally  sold.  The  Charitable  Associ- 
ation of  Mechanics,  in  this  city,  have  taken  the  accumulated 
savings  of  more  than  fifty  years,  and  therewith  built  a  costly 
establishment,  where  intoxicating  drink  is  needlessly  but 
abundantly  sold  !  Low  as  the  moral  standard  of  Boston  is, 
low  as  are  the  morals  of  the  press  and  trade,  I  had  hoped 
better  things  of  these  men,  who  live  in  the  midst  of  hard- 
working laborers,  and  see  the  miseries  of  intemperance  all 
about  them.  But  the  dollar  was  too  powerful  for  their  tem- 
perance. 

Here  are  splendid  houses,  where  the  rich  man  or  the 
thrifty  needlessly  drinks.  Let  me  leave  them  ;  the  evil 
Demon  of  Intemperance  appears  not  there  ;  he  is  there,  but 
under  well  made  garments,  amongst  educated  men,  who  are 
respected  and  still  respect  themselves.  Amid  merriment 
and  song  the  Demon  appears  not.  He  is  there,  gaunt,  bony, 
and  destructive,  but  so  elegantly  clad,  with  manners  so 
unoffending,  you  do  not  mark  his  face,  nor  fear  his  steps. 
But  go  down  to  that  miserable  lane,  where  men  mothered 
by  Misery  and  sired  by  Crime,  where  the  sons  of  Poverty 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  275 

and  the  daughters  of  Wretchedness  are  huddled  thick  togeth- 
er, and  you  see  this  Demon  of  Intemperance  in  all  his  ugli- 
ness. Let  me  speak  soberly  :  exaggeration  is  a  figure  of 
speech  I  would  always  banish  from  my  rhetoric,  here,  above 
all,  where  the  fact  is  more  appalling  than  any  fiction  I  could 
devise.  In  the  low  parts  of  Boston,  where  want  abounds, 
where  misery  abounds,  intemperance  abounds  yet  more,  to 
multiply  want,  to  aggravate  misery,  to  make  savage  what 
poverty  has  only  made  barbarian  ;  to  stimulate  passion  into 
crime.  Here  it  is  not  music  and  the  song  which  crown  the 
bowl ;  it  is  crowned  by  obscenity,  by  oaths,  by  curses,  by 
violence,  sometimes  by  murder.  These  twine  the  ivy  round 
the  poor  man's  bowl ;  no,  it  is  the  Upas  that  they  twine. 
Think  of  the  sufferings  of  the  drunkard  himself,  of  his  pov- 
erty, his  hunger  and  his  nakedness,  his  cold  ;  think  of  his 
battered  body  ;  of  his  mind  and  conscience,  how  they  are 
gone.  But  is  that  all  ?  Far  from  it.  These  curses  shall  be- 
come blows  upon  his  wife  ;  that  savage  violence  shall  be 
expended  on  his  child.  In  his  senses  this  man  was  a. barba- 
rian ;  there  are  centuries  of  civilization  betwixt  him  and  cul- 
tivated men.  But  the  man  of  wealth,  adorned  with  respect- 
ability and  armed  with  science,  harbors  a  Demon  in  the 
street,  a  profitable  Demon  to  the  rich  man  who  rents  his 
houses  for  such  a  use.  The  Demon  enters  our  barbarian,  who 
straightway  becomes  a  savage.  In  his  fury  he  tears  his 
wife  and  child.  The  law,  heedless  of  the  greater  culprits, 
the  Demon  and  the  demon-breeder,  seizes  our  savage  man 
and  shuts  him  in  the  jail.  Now  he  is  out  of  the  tempter's 
reach ;  let  us  leave  him  ;  let  us  go  to  his  home.  His  wife 
and  children  still  are  there,  freed  from  their  old  tormentor. 
Enter :  look  upon  the  squalor,  the  filth,  the  want,  the  mis- 
ery still  left  behind.  Eespectability  halts  at  the  door  with 
folded  arms,  and  can  no  further  go.  But  charity,  the  love 
of  man  which  never  fails,  enters  even  there  ;  enters  to 
lift  up  the  fallen,  to  cheer  the  despairing,  to  comfort  and  to 
bless.  Let  us  leave  her  there,  loving  the  unlovely,  and  turn 
to  other  sights. 


276  SERMON    OF    THE 

In  the  streets,  there  are  about  nine  hundred  needy  boys, 
and  about  two  hundred  needy  girls,  the  sons  and  daughters 
mainly  of  the  intemperate  ;  too  idle  or  too  thriftless  to  work  ; 
too  low  and  naked  for  the  public  school.  They  roam  about 
—  the  nomadic  tribes  of  this  town,  the  gipsies  of  Boston  — 
doing  some  chance  work  for  a  moment,  committing  some 
petty  theft.  The  temptations  of  a  great  city  are  before 
them.*  Soon  they  will  be  impressed  into  the  regular  army 
of  crime,  to  be  stationed  in  your  jails,  perhaps  to  die  on 
your  gallows.  Such  is  the  fate  of  the  sons  of  intemperance  ; 
but  the  daughters !  their  fate  —  let  me  not  tell  of  that. 

In  your  Legislature  they  have  just  been  discussing  a  law 
against  dogs,  for  now  and  then  a  man  is  bitten  and  dies  of 
hydrophobia.  Perhaps  there  are  ten  mad  dogs  in  the  State 
at  this  moment,  and  it  may  be  that  one  man  in  a  year  dies 
from  the  bite  of  such  !  Do  the  legislators  know  how  many 
shops  there  are  in  this  town,  in  this  State,  which  all  the  day 
and  all  the  year  sell  to  intemperate  men  a  poison  that 
maddens  with  a  hydrophobia  still  worse  ?  If  there  were  a 

*  The  conduct  of  public  magistrates  who  are  paid  for  serving  the 
people,  is  not  what  it  should  be  in  respect  to  temperance.  The  city 
authorities  allow  the  laws  touching  the  sale  of  the  great  instrument 
of  demoralization  to  be  violated  continually.  There  is  no  serious 
effort  made  to  enforce  these  laws.  Nor  is  this  all :  the  shameless 
conduct  of  conspicuous  men  at  the  supper  given  in  this  city  after  the 
funeral  of  John  Quincy  Adams,  and  the  debauchery  on  that  occasion, 
are  well  known  and  will  long  be  remembered. 

At  the  next  festival,  (in  September,  18.51,)  it  is  notorious,  that  the 
city  authorities,  at  the  expense  of  the  citizens,  provided  a  large 
quantity  of  intoxicating  drink  for  the  entertainment  of  our  guests 
during  the  excursion  in  the  harbor.  It  is  also  a  matter  of  great 
notoriety,  that  many  were  drunk  on  that  occasion.  I  need  hardly 
add,  that  on  board  one  of  the  crowded  steamboats,  three  cheers 
were  given  for  the  "  Fugitive  Slave  Law,"  by  men  who  it  is  hoped 
will  at  length  become  sober  enough  to  "  forget "  it.  When  the  ma- 
gistrates of  Boston  do  such  deeds,  and  are  not  even  officially  friends 
of  temperance,  what  shall  we  expect  of  the  poor  and  the  ignorant 
and  the  miserable ?  "Cain,  where  is  thy  Brother"?  may  be  asked 
here  and  now  as  well  as  in  the  Bible  story. 


MORAL  CONDITION  OF  BOSTON.         277 

thousand  mad  dogs  in  the  land,  if  wealthy  men  had  em- 
barked a  large  capital  in  the  importation  or  the  production 
of  mad  dogs,  and  if  they  bit  and  maddened  and  slew  ten 
thousand  men  in  a  year,  do  you  believe  your  Legislature 
would  discuss  that  evil  with  such  fearless  speech  ?  Then 
you  are  very  young,  and  know  little  of  the  tyranny  of  public 
opinion,  and  the  power  of  money  to  silence  speech,  while 
justice  still  comes  in,  with  feet  of  wool  but  iron  hands.* 

There  is  yet  another  witness  to  the  moral  condition  of 
Boston.  I  mean  Crime.  Where  there  is  such  poverty  and 
intemperance,  crime  may  be  expected  to  follow.  I  will  not 

*  The  statistics  of  intemperance  are  instructive  and  surprising. 
Of  the  one  thousand  two  hundred  houses  in  Boston  where  intoxi- 
cating drink  is  retailed  to  be  drunken  on  the  premises,  suppose  that 
two  hundred  are  too  insignificant  to  be  noticed,  or  else  are  large 
hotels  to  be  considered  presently  ;  then  there  are  one  thousand  com- 
mon retail  groggeries.  Suppose  they  are  in  operation  three  hundred 
and  thirteen  days  in  the  year,  twelve  hours  each  day  ;  that  they  sell 
one  glass  in  a  little  less  than  ten  minutes,  or  one  hundred  glasses  in 
the  day,  and  that  five  cents  is  the  price  of  a  glass.  Then  each 
groggery  receives  85  a  day,  or  $1,565  (313  +  5)  in  a  year,  and  the 
one  thousand  groggeries  receive  $1,565,000.  Let  us  suppose  that 
each  sells  drink  for  really  useful  purposes  to  the  amount  of  $65 
per  annum,  or  all  to  the  amount  of  $65,000  ;  there  still  remains 
the  sum  of  $1,500,000  spent  for  intemperance  in  these  one  thousand 
groggeries.  This  is  about  twice  the  sum  raised  by  taxation  for  the 
public  education  of  all  the  children  in  the  State  of  Massachusetts  ! 
But  this  calculation  does  not  equal  the  cost  of  intemperance  in  these 
places ;  the  receipts  of  these  retail  houses  cannot  be  less  than 
$2,000  per  annum,  or  in  the  aggregate,  $2,000,000.  This  sum  in 
two  years  would  pay  for  the  new  Aqueduct.  Suppose  the  amount 
paid  for  the  needless,  nay,  for  the  injurious  use  of  intoxicating  drink 
in  private  families,  in  boarding  houses  and  hotels,  is  equal  to  the 
smallest  sum  above  named  ($1,500,000),  then  it  appears  that  the 
city  of  Boston  spends  ($1,500,000  +  $1,500,000=)  $3,000,000  an- 
nually for  an  article  that  does  no  good  to  any  but  harm  to  all,  and 
brings  ruin  on  thousands  each  year.  But  if  a  schoolhouse  or  a 
school  costs  a  little  money,  a  complaint  is  soon  made. 
24 


278  SERMON    OF    THE 

now  dwell  upon  this  theme  ;  only  let  me  say,  that  in  1848, 
three  thousand  four  hundred  and  thirty-five  grown  persons, 
and  six  hundred  and  seventy-one  minors  were  lawfully 
sentenced  to  your  jail  and  House  of  Correction  ;  in  all,  four 
thousand  one  hundred  and  six  ;  three  thousand  four  hundred 
and  forty-four  persons  were  arrested  by  the  night  police,  and 
eleven  thousand  one  hundred  and  seventy-eight  were  taken 
into  custody  by  the  watch ;  at  one  time  there  were  one 
hundred  and  forty-four  in  the  common  jail.  I  have  already 
mentioned  that  more  than  a  thousand  boys  and  girls,  between 
six  and  sixteen,  wander  as  vagrants  about  your  streets ;  two 
hundred  and  thirty-eight  of  these  are  children  of  widows, 
fifty-four  have  neither  parents  living.  It  is  a  fact  known  to 
your  police,  that  about  one  thousand  two  hundred  shops  are 
unlawfully  open  for  retailing  the  means  of  intemperance. 
These  are  most  thickly  strown  in  the  haunts  of  poverty.  On 
a  single  Sunday  the  police  found  three  hundred  and  thirteen 
shops  in  the  full  experiment  of  unblushing  and  successful 
crime.  These  rum-shops  are  the  factories  of  crime  ;  the 
raw  material  is  furnished  by  poverty  ;  it  passes  into  the 
hands  of  the  rum-seller,  and  is  soon  ready  for  delivery  at  the 
mouth  of  the  jail,  or  the  foot  of  the  gallows.  It  is  notorious 
that  intemperance  is  the  proximate  cause  of  three  fourths  of 
the  crime  in  Boston  ;  yet  it  is  very  respectable  to  own  houses 
and  rent  them  for  the  purpose  of  making  men  intemperate  ; 
nobody  loses  his  standing  by  that.  I  am  not  surprised  to 
hear  of  women  armed  with  knives,  and  boys  with  six- 
barrelled  revolvers  in  their  pockets ;  not  surprised  at  the 
increase  of  capital  trials. 

One  other  matter  let  me  name  —  I  call  it  the  Crime  against 
Woman.  Let  us  see  the  evil  in  its  type,  its  most  significant 
form.  Look  at  that  thing  of  corruption  and  of  shame, 
almost  without  shame,  whom  the  judge,  with  brief  words, 
dispatches  to  the  jail.  That  was  a  woman  once.  No  !  At 
least,  she  was  once  a  girl.  She  had  a  mother ;  perhaps, 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  279 

beyond  the  hills,  a  mother,  in  her  evening  prayer,  remem- 
bers still  this  one  child  more  tenderly  than  all  the  folded 
flowers  that  slept  the  sleep  of  infancy  beneath  her  roof; 
remembers,  with  a  prayer,  her  child,  whom  the  world  curses 
after  it  has  made  corrupt !  Perhaps  she  had  no  such  mother, 
but  was  born  in  the  filth  of  some  reeking  cellar,  and  turned 
into  the  mire  of  the  streets,  in  her  undefended  innocence, 
to  mingle  with  the  coarseness,  the  intemperance,  and  the 
crime  of  a  corrupt  metropolis.  In  either  case,  her  blood  is 
on  our  hands.  The  crime  which  is  so  terribly  avenged  on 
woman  —  think  you  that  God  will  hold  men  innocent  of 
that  ?  But  on  this  sign  of  our  moral  state,  I  will  not  long 
delay. 

Put  all  these  things  together :  the  character  of  trade,  of 
the  press  ;  take  the  evidence  of  poverty,  intemperance,  and 
crime  —  it  all  reveals  a  sad  state  of  things.  I  call  your 
attention  to  these  facts.  We  are  all  affected  by  them  more 
or  less  ;  all  more  or  less  accountable  for  them. 

Hitherto  I  have  only  stated  facts,  without  making  com- 
parisons. Let  me  now  compare  the  present  condition  of 
Boston  with  that  in  former  times.  Every  man  has  an  ideal, 
which  is  better  than  the  actual  facts  about  him.  Some  men 
amongst  us  put  that  ideal  in  times  past,  and  maintain  it  was 
then  an  historical  fact ;  they  are  commonly  men  who  have 
little  knowledge  of  the  past,  and  less  hope  for  the  future  ;  a 
good  deal  of  reverence  for  old  precedents,  little  for  justice, 
truth,  humanity ;  little  confidence  in  mankind,  and  a  great 
deal  of  fear  of  new  things.  Such  men  love  to  look  back 
and  do  homage  to  the  past,  but  it  is  only  a  past  of  fancy, 
not  of  fact,  they  do  homage  to.  They  tell  us  we  have 
fallen ;  that  the  golden  age  is  behind  us,  and  the  garden  of 
Eden  ;  ours  are  degenerate  days ;  the  men  are  inferior,  the 
women  less  winning,  less  witty,  and  less  wise,  and  the  chil- 
dren are  an  untoward  generation,  a  disgrace,  not  so  much 


280  SERMON    OP    THE 

to  their  fathers,  but  certainly  to  their  grandsires.  Some- 
times this  is  the  complaint  of  men  who  have  grown  old ; 
sometimes  of  such  as  seem  to 'be  old  without  growing  so, 
who  seem  born  to  the  gift  of  age,  without  the  grace  of 
youth. 

Other  men  have  a  similar  ideal,  commonly  a  higher  one, 
but  they  place  it  in  the  future,  not  as  an  historical  reality, 
which  has  been,  and  is  therefore  to  be  worshipped,  but  one 
which  is  to  be  made  real  by  dint  of  thought,  of  work.  I 
have  known  old  persons  who  stoutly  maintained  that  the 
pears  and  the  plums  and  the  peaches,  are  not  half  so  lus- 
cious as  they  were  many  years  ago ;  so  they  bewailed  the 
existing  race  of  fruits,  complaining  of  "  the  general  decay  " 
of  sweetness,  and  brought  over  to  their  way  of  speech  some 
aged  juveniles.  Meanwhile,  men  born  young,  set  themselves 
to  productive  work,  and,  instead  of  bewailing  an  old  fancy, 
realized  a  new  ideal  in  new  fruits,  bigger,  fairer,  and  better 
than  the  old.  It  is  to  men  of  this  latter  stamp,  that  we  must 
look  for  criticism  and  for  counsel.  The  others  can  afford 
us  a  warning,  if  not  by  their  speech,  at  least  by  their  ex- 
ample. 

It  is  very  plain,  that  the  people  of  New  England  are  ad- 
vancing in  wealth,  in  intelligence,  and  in  morality ;  but  in 
this  general  march,  there  are  little  apparent  pauses,  slight 
waverings  from  side  to  side  ;  some  virtues  seem  to  straggle 
from  the  troop  ;  some  to  lag  behind,  for  it  is  not  always  the 
same  virtue  that  leads  the  van.  It  is  with  the  flock  of  vir- 
tues, as  with  wild  fowl  —  the  leaders  alternate.  It  is  prob- 
able that  the  morals  of  New  England  in  general,  and  of 
Boston  in  special,  did  decline  somewhat  from  1775  to  1790 ; 
there  were  peculiar  but  well  known  causes,  which  no  longer 
exist,  to  work  that  result.  In  the  previous  fifteen  years,  it 
seems  probable  that  there  had  been  a  rapid  increase  of  mo- 
rality, through  the  agency  of  causes  equally  peculiar  and 
transient.  To  estimate  the  moral  growth  or  decline  of  this 
town,  we  must  not  take  either  period  as  a  standard.  But 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  281 

take  the  history  of  Boston,  from  1650  to  1700,  from  1700 
to  1750,  thence  to  1800,  and  you  will  see  a  gradual,  but  a 
decided  progress  in  morality  in  each  of  these  periods.  It 
is  not  easy  to  prove  this  in  a  short  sermon  ;  I  can  only  indi- 
cate the  points  of  comparison,  and  state  the  general  fact. 
From  1800  to  1849,  this  progress  is  well  marked,  indisput- 
able, and  very  great.  Let  us  look  at  this  a  little  in  detail, 
pursuing  the  same  order  of  thought  as  before. 

It  is  generally  conceded  that  the  moral  character  of  trade 
has  improved  a  good  deal  within  fifty  or  sixty  years.  It 
was  formerly  a  common  saying,  that  "  If  a  Yankee  mer- 
chant were  to  sell  salt  water  at  high  tide,  he  would  yet  cheat 
in  the  measure."  The  saying  was  founded  on  the  conduct 
of  American  traders  abroad,  in  the  West  Indies  and  else- 
where. Now  things  have  changed  for  the  better.  I  have 
been  told  by  competent  authority,  that  two  of  the  most 
eminent  merchants  of  Boston,  fifty  or  sixty  years  ago,  who 
conducted  each  a  large  business,  and  left  very  large  for- 
tunes, were  notoriously  guilty  of  such  dishonesty  in  trade, 
as  would  now  drive  any  man  from  the  Exchange.  The 
facility  with  which  notes  are  collected  by  the  banks,  com- 
pared to  the  former  method  of  collection,  is  itself  a  proof 
of  an  increase  of  practical  honesty  ;  the  law  for  settling  the 
afFairs  of  a  bankrupt  tells  the  same  thing.  Now  this  change 
has  not  come  from  any  special  effort,  made  to  produce  this 
particular  effect,  and,  accordingly,  it  indicates  the  general 
moral  progress  of  the  community. 

The  general  character  of  the  press,  since  the  end  of  the 
last  century,  has  decidedly  improved,  as  any  one  may  con- 
vince himself  of,  by  comparing  the  newspapers  of  that  period, 
with  the  present ;  yet  a  publicity  is  now-a-days  given  to  cer- 
tain things  which  were  formerly  kept  more  closely  from  the 
public  eye  and  ear.  This  circumstance  sometimes  produ- 
ces an  apparent  increase  of  wrong-doing,  while  it  is  only  an 
increased  publicity  thereof.  Political  servility,  and  political 
rancor,  are  certainly  bad  enough,  and  base  enough,  at  this 
24* 


282  SERMON    OF    THE 

day,  but  not  long  ago  both  were  baser  and  worse  ;  to  show 
this,  1  need  only  appeal  to  the  memories  of  men  before  me, 
who  can  recollect  the  beginning  of  the  present  century. 
Political  controversies  are  conducted  with  less  bitterness  than 
before  ;  honesty  is  -more  esteemed  ;  private  worth  is  more 
respected.  It  is  not  many  years  since  the  Federal  party, 
composed  of  men  who  certainly  were  an  honor  to  their  age, 
supported  Aaron  Burr,  for  the  office  of  President  of  the 
United  States  ;  a  man  whose  character,  both  public  and 
private,  was  notoriously  marked  with  the  deepest  infamy. 
Political  parties  are  not  very  puritanical  in  their  virtue  at 
this  day  ;  but  I  think  no  party  would  now  for  a  moment 
accept  such  a  man  as  Mr.  Burr,  for  such  a  post.*  There  is 
another  pleasant  sign  of  this  improvement  in  political  par- 
ties :  last  autumn  the  victorious  party,  in  two  wards  of  this 
city,  made  a  beautiful  demonstration  of  joy,  at  their  success 
in  the  Presidential  election,  and  on  Thanksgiving  day,  and 
on  Christmas,  gave  a  substantial  dinner  to  each  poor  person 
in  their  section  of  the  town.  It  was  a  trifle,  but  one  pleasant 
to  remember. 

Even  the  theological  journals  have  improved  within  a  few 
years.  I  know  it  has  been  said  that  some  of  them  are  not 
only  behind  their  times,  which  is  true,  "  but  behind  all 
times."  It  is  not  so.  Compared  with  the  sectarian  writings  — 
tracts,  pamphlets,  and  hard-bound  volumes  of  an  earlier 
day —  they  are  human,  enlightened,  and  even  liberal. 

In  respect  to  poverty,  there  has  been  a  great  change  for 
the  better.  However,  it  may  be  said  in  general,  that  a  good 
deal  of  the  poverty,  intemperance,  and  crime,  is  of  foreign 
origin  ;  we  are  to  deal  with  it,  to  be  blamed  if  we  allow  it 
to  continue ;  not  at  all  to  be  blamed  for  its  origin.  I  know 
it  is  often  said,  "  The  poor  are  getting  poorer,  and  soon  will 
become  the  mere  vassals  of  the  rich  ;  "  that  "  The  past  is 
full  of  discouragement ;  the  future  full  of  fear."  1  cannot 

*It  must  be  remembered  that  this  was  written,  not  in  1851,  but 
1849. 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  283 

think  so.  I  feel  neither  the  discouragement  nor  the  fear. 
It  should  be  remembered  that  many  of  the  Fathers  of  New 
England  owned  the  bodies  of  their  laborers  and  domestics  ! 
The  condition  of  the  working  man  has  improved,  relatively 
to  the  wealth  of  the  land,  ever  since.  The  wages  of  any 
kind  of  labor,  at  this  day,  bear  a  higher  proportion  to  the 
things  needed  for  comfort  and  convenience,  than  ever  before 
for  two  hundred  years. 

If  you  go  back  one  hundred  years,  I  think  you  will  find 
that,  in  proportion  to  the  population  and  wealth  of  this  town 
or  this  State,  there  was  considerably  more  suffering  from 
native  poverty  then  than  now.  I  have  not,  however,  before 
me  the  means  of  absolute  proof  of  this  statement ;  but  this 
is  plain,  that  now  public  charity  is  more  extended,  more 
complete,  works  in  a  wiser  mode,  and  with  far  more  bene- 
ficial effect ;  and  that  pains  are  now  taken  to  uproot  the 
causes  of  poverty  —  pains  which  our  fathers  never  thought 
of.  In  proof  of  this  increase  of  charity,  and  even  of  the 
existence  of  justice,  I  need  only  refer  to  the  numerous 
benevolent  societies  of  modern  origin,  and  to  the  establish- 
ment of  the  ministry  at  large,  in  this  city  —  the  latter  the 
work  of  Unitarian  philanthropy.  Some  other  churches  have 
done  a  little  in  this  good  work.  But  none  have  done  much. 
I  am  told  the  Catholic  clergy  of  this  city  do  little  to  remove 
the  great  mass  of  poverty,  intemperance,  and  crime  among 
their  followers.  I  know  there  are  some  few  honorable 
exceptions,  and  how  easy  it  is  for  Protestant  hostility  to 
exaggerate  matters ;  still,  I  fear  the  reproach  is  but  too  well 
founded,  that  the  Catholic  clergy  are  not  vigilant  shepherds, 
who  guard  their  sacred  flock  against  the  terrible  wolves 
which  prowl  about  the  fold.  I  wish  to  find  myself  mis- 
taken here. 

Some  of  you  remember  the  "  Old  Almshouse  "  in  Park- 
street  ;  the  condition  and  character  of  its  inmates ;  the  effect 
of  the  treatment  they  there  received.  I  do  not  say  that  our 
present  attention  to  the  subject  of  poverty  is  any  thing  to 


284  SERMON    OF    THE 

boast  of — certainly  we  have  done  little  in  comparison  with 
what  common  sense  demands ;  very  little  in  comparison 
with  what  Christianity  enjoins ;  still  it  is  something ;  in 
comparison  with  "  the  good  old  times,"  it  is  much  that  we 
are  doing. 

There  has  been  a  great  change  for  the  better  in  the  mat- 
ter of  intemperance  in  drinking.  Within  thirty  years,  the 
progress  towards  sobriety  is  surprising,  and  so  well  marked 
and  obvious  that  to  name  it  is  enough.  Probably  there  is 
not  a  "  respectable "  man  in  Boston  who  would  not  be 
ashamed  to  have  been  seen  drunk  yesterday  ;"even  to  have 
been  drunk  in  ever  so  private  a  manner ;  not  one  who 
would  willingly  get  a  friend  or  a  guest  in  that  condition 
to-day  !  Go  back  a  few  years,  and  it  brought  no  public 
reproach,  and,  I  fear,  no  private  shame.  A  few  years 
further  back,  it  was  not  a  rare  thing,  on  great  occasions, 
for  the  fathers  of  the  town  to  reel  and  stagger  from  their 
intemperance  —  the  magistrates  of  the  land  voluntarily  fur- 
nishing the  warning  which  a  romantic  historian  says  the 
Spartans  forced  upon  their  slaves. 

It  is  easy  to  praise  the  Fathers  of  New  England  ;  easier 
to  praise  them  for  virtues  they  did  not  possess,  than  to  dis- 
criminate, and  fairly  judge  those  remarkable  men.  I  admire 
and  venerate  their  characters,  but  they  were  rather  hard 
drinkers ;  certainly  a  love  of  cold  water  was  not  one  of 
their  loves.  Let  me  mention  a  fact  or  two  :  it  is  recorded 
in  the  Probate  office,  that  in  1678,  at  the  funeral  of  Mrs. 
Mary  Norton,  widow  of  the  celebrated  John  Norton,  one  of 
the  ministers  of  the  first  church  in  Boston,  fifty-one  gallons 
and  a  half  of  the  best  Malaga  wine  were  consumed  by  the 
"  mourners ;"  in  1685,  at  the  funeral  of  the  Rev.  Thomas 
Cobbett,  minister  at  Ipswich,  there  were  consumed  one 
barrel  of  wine  and  two  barrels  of  cider  —  "and  as  it  was 
cold,"  there  was  "  some  spice  and  ginger  for  the  cider." 
You  may  easily  judge  of  the  drunkenness  and  riot  on  occa- 
sions less  solemn  than  the  funeral  of  an  old  and  beloved 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  285 

minister.  Towns  provided  intoxicating  drink  at  the  funeral 
of  their  paupers  ;  in  Salem,  in  1728,  at  the  funeral  of  a 
pauper,  a  gallon  of  wine  and  another  of  cider  are  charged 
as  "  incidental ;"  the  next  year,  six  gallons  of  rum  on  a 
similar  occasion;  in  Lynn,  in  1711,  ihe  town  furnished 
"  half  a  harrel  of  cider  for  the  Widow  Dispaw's  funeral." 
Affairs  had  come  to  such  a  pass,  that  in  1742,  the  General 
Court  forbade  the  use  of  wine  and  rum  at  funerals.  In 
1673,  Increase  Mather  published  his  "  Wo  unto  Drunkards." 
Governor  Winthrop  complains,  in  1630,  that  "  The  young 
folk  gave  themselves  to  drink  hot  waters  very  immode- 
rately."* 

*In  1679,  "The  Reforming  Synod,"  assembled  at  Boston,  thus 
complained  of  intemperance,  amougst  other  sins  of  the  times  :  "  That 
heathenish  and  idolatrous  practice  of  health-drinking  is  too  fre- 
quent. That  shameful  iniquity  of  sinful  drinking  is  become  too 
general  a  provocation.  Days  of  training  and  other  public  solemnities 
have  been  abused  in  this  respect :  and  not  only  English  but  Indians 
have  been  debauched  by  those  that  call  themselves  Christians.  .  . 
This  is  a  crying  sin,  and  the  more  aggravated  in  that  the  first 
planters  of  this  colony  did  .  .  .  come  into  this  land  with  a 
design  to  convert  the  heathen  unto  Christ,  but  if  instead  of  that 
they  be  taught  wickedness  ...  the  Lord  may  well  punish  by 
them.  .  .  .  There  are  more  temptations  and  occasions  unto  that 
sin  publicly  allowed  of,  than  any  necessity  doth  require.  The  proper 
end  of  taverns,  &c.  being  for  the  entertainment  of  strangers  .  .  • 
a  far  less  number  would  suffice,"  &c. 

Cotton  Mather  says  of  intemperance  in  his  time  :  "  To  see  .  .  . 
a  drunken  man  become  a  drowned  man,  is  to  see  but  a  most 
retaliating  hand  of  God.  Why  we  have  seen  this  very  thing  more 
than  threescore  times  in  our  land.  And  I  remember  the  drowning  of 
one  drunkard,  so  oddly  circumstanced  j  it  was  in  the  hold  of  a  vessel 
that  lay  full  of  water  near  the  shore.  We  have  seen  it  so  often,  that 
I  am  amazed  at  you,  0  ye  drunkards  of  New  England ;  I  am 
amazed  that  you  can  harden  your  hearts  in  your  sin,  without  ex- 
pecting to  be  destroyed  suddenly  and  without  remedy.  Yea,  and  we 
have  seen  the  devil  that  has  possessed  the  drunkard,  throwing  him 
into  fire,  and  then  kept  shrieking  Fire !  Fire  !  till  they  have  gone 
down  to  the  fire  that  never  shall  be  quenched.  Yea,  more  than  one 


'286  SERMON    OF    THE 

But  I  need  not  go  back  so  far.  Who  that  is  fifty  years  of 
age,  does  not  remember  the  aspect  of  Boston  on  public 
days  ;  on  the  evening  of  such  days  ?  Compare  the  "  Elec- 
tion day,"  or  the  Fourth  of  July,  as  they  were  kept  thirty 
or  forty  years  ago,  with  such  days  in  our  time.  Some  of 
you  remember  the  celebration  of  Peace,  in  1783  ;  many  of 
you  can  recollect  the  similar  celebration  in  1815.  On  each 
of  those  days  the  inhabitants  from  the  country  towns  came 
here  to  rejoice  with  the  citizens  of  this  town.  Compare  the 
riot,  the  confusion,  the  drunkenness  then,  with  the  order, 
decorum,  and  sobriety  of  the  celebration  at  the  introduction 
of  water  last  autumn,  and  you  see  what  has  been  done  in 
sixty  or  seventy  years  for  temperance. 

A  great  deal  of  the  crime  in  Boston  is  of  foreign  origin : 
of  the  one  thousand  and  sixty-six  children  vagrant  in  your 
streets,  only  one  hundred  and  three  had  American  parents ; 
of  the  nine  hundred  and  thirty-three  persons  in  the  House 
of  Correction  here,  six  hundred  and  sixteen  were  natives  of 
other  countries  ;  I  know  not  how  many  were  the  children  of 
Irishmen,  who  had  not  enjoyed  the  advantages  of  our 
institutions.  I  cannot  tell  how  many  rum-shops  are  kept 
by  foreigners.*  Now  in  Ireland  no  pains  have  been  taken 
with  the  education  of  the  people  by  the  Government ;  very 
little  by  the  Catholic  church  ;  indeed,  the  British  govern- 
ment for  a  long  time  rendered  it  impossible  for  the  church 
to  do  any  thing  in  this  way.  For  more  than  seventy  years, 
in  that  Catholic  country,  none  but  a  Protestant  could  keep  a 

or  two  drunken  women  in  this  very  town,  have,  while  in  their  drink, 
fallen  into  the  fire,  and  so  they  have  tragically  gone  roaring  out  of 
one  fire  into  another.  O  ye  daughters  of  Belial,  hear  and  fear  and 
do  wickedly  no  more." 

The  history  of  the  first  barrel  of  rum  which  was  brought  to 
Plymouth  has  been  carefully  traced  out  to  a  considerable  extent. 
Nearly  forty  of  the  "  Pilgrims  "  or  their  descendants  were  publicly 
punished  for  the  drunkenness  it  occasioned. 

*  Over  eight  hunc'red  in  1851. 


MORAL  CONDITION  OF  BOSTON.         287 

school  or  even  be  a  tutor  in  a  private  family.  A  Catholic 
schoolmaster  was  to  be  transported,  and,  if  he  returned, 
adjudged  guilty  of  high  treason,  barbarously  put  to  death, 
drawn  and  quartered.  A  Protestant  schoolmaster  is  as 
repulsive  to  a  Catholic,  as  a  Mahometan  schoolmaster  or  an 
Atheist  would  be  to  you.  It  is  not  surprising,  therefore, 
that  the  Irish  are  ignorant,  and,  as  a  consequence  thereof, 
are  idle,  thriftless,  poor,  intemperate,  and  barbarian  ;  not  to 
be  wondered  at  if  they  conduct  like  wild  beasts  when  they 
are  set  loose  in  a  land  where  we  think  the  individual  must 
be  left  free  to  the  greatest  extent.  Of  course  they  will 
violate  our  laws,  those  wild  bisons  leaping  over  the  fences 
which  easily  restrain  the  civilized  domestic  cattle ;  will 
commit  the  great  crimes  of  violence,  even  capital  offences, 
which  certainly  have  increased  rapidly  of  late.  This  in- 
crease of  foreigners  is  prodigious :  more  than  half  the 
children  in  your  public  schools  are  children  of  foreigners  ; 
there  are  more  Catholic  than  Protestant  children  born  in 
Boston. 

With  the  general  and  unquestionable  advance  of  morality, 
some  offences  are  regarded  as  crimes  which  were  not 
noticed  a  few  years  ago.  Drunkenness  is  an  example  of 
this.  An  Irishman  in  his  native  country  thinks  little  of 
beating  another  or  being  beaten  ;  he  brings  his  habits  of 
violence  with  him,  and  does  not  at  once  learn  to  conform  to 
our  laws.  Then,  too,  a  good  deal  of  crime  which  was  once 
concealed  is  now  brought  to  light  by  the  press,  by  the 
superior  activity  of  the  police ;  and  yet,  after  all  that  is 
said,  it  seems  quite  clear  that  what  is  legally  called  crime 
and  committed  by  Americans,  has  diminished  a  good  deal  in 
fifty  years.  Such  crime,  I  think,  never  bore  so  small  a 
proportion  to  the  population,  wealth,  and  activity  of  Boston, 
as  now.  Even  if  we  take  all  the  offences  committed  by 
these  strangers  who  have  come  amongst  us,  it  does  not 
compare  so  very  unfavorably  as  some  allege  with  the  "  good 
old  times."  I  know  men  often  look  on  the  fathers  of  this 


288  SERMON    OF    THE 

colony  as  saints  ;  but  in  1635,  at  a  time  when  the  whole 
State  contained  less  than  one  tenth  of  the  present  population 
of  Moston,  and  they  were  scattered  from  Weymouth  Fore- 
lliver  to  the  Merri mack,  the  first  grand  jury  ever  empannelled 
at  Boston  "  found  "  a  hundred  bills  of  indictment  at  their 
first  coming  together. 

If  you  consider  the  circumstances  of  the  class  who  com- 
mit the  greater  part  of  the  crimes  which  get  punished,  you 
will  not  wonder  at  the  amount.  The  criminal  court  is  their 
school  of  morals ;  the  constable  and  judge  are  their  teach- 
ers; but  under  this  rude  tuition  I  am  told  that  the  Irish 
improve  and  actually  become  better.  The  children  who 
receive  the  instruction  of  our  public  schools,  imperfect  as 
they  are,  will  be  better  than  their  fathers ;  and  their  grand- 
children will  have  lost  all  trace  of  their  barbarian  descent. 

I  have  often  spoken  of  our  penal  law  as  wrong  in  its 
principle,  taking  it  for  granted  that  the  ignorant  and  mis- 
erable men  who  commit  crime  do  it  always  from  wicked- 
ness, and  not  from  the  pressure  of  circumstances  which 
have  brutalized  the  man ;  wrong  in  its  aim,  which  is  to 
take  vengeance  on  the  offender,  and  not  to  do  him  a  good 
in  return  for  the  evil  he  has  done ;  wrong  in  its  method, 
which  is  to  inflict  a  punishment  that  is  wholly  arbitrary, 
and  then  to  send  the  punished  man,  overwhelmed  with  new 
disgrace,  back  to  society,  often  made  worse  than  before, — 
not  to  keep  him  till  we  can  correct,  cure,  and  send  him 
back  a  reformed  man.  I  would  retract  nothing  of  what  I 
have  often  said  of  that ;  but  not  long  ago  all  this  was  worse  ; 
the  particular  statutes  were  often  terribly  unjust ;  the  forms 
of  trial  afforded  the  accused  but  little  chance  of  justice  ; 
the  punishments  were  barbarous  and  terrible.  The  plebeian 
tyranny  of  the  Lord  Brethren  in  New  England  was  not 
much  lighter  than  the  patrician  despotism  of  the  Lord 
Bishops  in  the  old  world,  and  was  more  insulting.  Let  me 
mention  a  few  facts,  to  refresh  the  memories  of  those  who 
think  we  are  going  to  ruin,  and  can  only  save  ourselves  by 


MORAL  CONDITION  OF  BOSTON.          289 

holding  to  the  customs  of  our  fathers,  and  of  the  "  good  old 
times."  In  1631,  a  man  was  fined  forty  pounds,  whipped 
on  the  naked  back,  both  his  ears  cut  off,  and  then  banished 
this  colony,  for  uttering  hard  speeches  against  the  govern- 
ment and  the  church  at  Salem.  In  the  first  century  of  the 
existence  of  this  town,  the  magistrates  could  banish  a  woman 
because  she  did  not  like  the  preaching,  nor  all  the  ministers, 
and  told  the  people  why  ;  they  could  whip  women  naked  in 
the  streets,  because  they  spoke  reproachfully  of  the  magis- 
trates ;  they  could  fine  men  twenty  pounds,  and  then  banish 
them,  for  comforting  a  man  in  jail  before  his  trial ;  they 
could  pull  down,  with  legal  formality,  the  house  of  a  man 
they  did  not  like  ;  they  could  whip  women  at  a  cart's  tail 
from  Salem  to  Rhode  Island,  for  fidelity  to  their  conscience  ; 
they  could  beat,  imprison,  and  banish  men  out  of  the  land, 
simply  for  baptizing  one  another  in  a  stream  of  water, 
instead  of  sprinkling  them  from  a  dish  ;  they  could  crop  the 
ears,  and  scourge  the  backs,  and  bore  the  tongues  of  men, 
for  being  Quakers  ;  yes,  they  could  shut  them  in  jails,  could 
banish  them  out  of  the  colony,  could  sell  them  as  slaves, 
could  hang  them  on  a  gallows,  solely  for  worshipping 
God  after  their  own  conscience  ;  they  could  convulse  the 
whole  land,  and  hang  some  thirty  or  forty  men  for  witch- 
craft, and  do  all  this  in  the  name  of  God,  and  then  sing 
psalms,  with  most  nasal  twang,  and  pray  by  the  hour,  and 
preach  —  I  will  not  say  how  long,  nor  what,  nor  how  !  It 
is  not  yet  one  hundred  years  since  two  slaves  were  judi- 
cially burnt  alive,  on  Boston  Neck,  for  poisoning  .their 
master. 

But  why  talk  of  days  so  old  ?  Some  of  you  remember 
when  the  pillory  and  the  whipping-post  were  a  part  of  the 
public  furniture  of  the  law,  and  occupied  a  prominent  place 
in  the  busiest  street  in  town.  Some  of  you  have  seen  men 
and  women  scourged,  naked,  and  bleeding,  in  State-street ; 
have  seen  men  judicially  branded  in  the  forehead  with  a  hot 
iron,  their  ears  clipped  off  by  the  sheriff,  and  held  up  to 
25 


290  SERMON    OF    THE 

teach  humanity  to  the  gaping  crowd  of  idle  boys  and  vulgar 
men.  A  magistrate  was  once  brought  into  odium  in  Boston, 
for  humanely  giving  back  to  his  victim  a  part  of  the  ear  he 
had  officially  shorn  off,  that  the  mutilated  member  might  be 
restored  and  made  whole.  How  long  is  it  since  men  sent 
their  servants  to  the  "  Workhouse,"  to  be  beaten  "  for  diso- 
bedience," at  the  discretion  of  the  master  ?  It  is  not  long 
since  the  gallows  was  a  public  spectacle  here  in  the  midst 
of  us,  and  a  hanging  made  a  holiday  for  the  rabble  of 
this  city  and  the  neighboring  towns  ;  even  women  came  to 
see  the  death-struggle  of  a  fellow-creature,  and  formed  the 
larger  part  of  the  rnob  ;  many  of  you  remember  the  proces- 
sion of  the  condemned  man  sitting  on  his  coffin,  a  proces- 
sion from  the  jail  to  the  gallows,  from  one  end  of  the  city  to 
the  other.  I  remember  a  public  execution  some  fourteen  or 
fifteen  years  ago,  and  some  of  the  students  of  theology  at 
Cambridge,  of  undoubted  soundness  in  the  Unitarian  faith, 
came  here  to  see  men  kill  a  fellow-man ! 

Who  can  think  of  these  things,  and  not  see  that  a  great 
progress  has  been  made  in  no  long  time.  But  if  these  things 
be  not  proof  enough,  then  consider  what  has  been  done  here 
in  this  century  for  the  reformation  of  juvenile  offenders ; 
for  the  discharged  convict;  for  the  blind,  the  deaf,  and  the 
dumb  ;  for  the  insane,  and  now  even  for  the  idiot.  Think 
of  the  numerous  Societies  for  the  widows  and  orphans ;  for 
the  seamen  ;  the  Temperance  Societies  ;  the  Peace  Socie- 
ties ;  the  Prison  Discipline  Society  ;  the  mighty  movement 
against  slavery,  which,  beginning  with  a  few  heroic  men 
who  took  the  roaring  lion  of  public  opinion  by  the  beard, 
fearless  of  his  roar,  has  gone  on  now,  till  neither  the  hardest 
nor  the  softest  courage  in  the  State  dares  openly  defend  the 
unholy  institution.  A  philanthropic  female  physician  deliv- 
ers gratuitous  lectures  on  physiology  to  the  poor  of  this  city, 
to  enable  them  to  take  better  care  of  their  houses  and  their 
bodies  ;  an  unpretending  man,  for  years  past,  responsible  to 
none  but  God,  has  devoted  all  his  time  and  his  toil  to  the 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  291 

most  despised  class  of  men,  and  has  saved  hundreds  from 
the  jail,  from  crime  and  ruin  at  the  last.  Here  are  many 
men  and  women  not  known  to  the  public,  but  known  to  the 
poor,  who  are  daily  ministering  to  the  wants  of  the  body  and 
the  mind.  Consider  all  these  things,  and  who  can  doubt 
that  a  great  moral  progress  has  been  made  ?  It  is  not  many 
years  since  we  had  white  slaves,  and  a  Scotch  boy  was 
invoiced  at  fourteen  pounds  lawful  money,  in  the  inventory 
of  an  estate  in  Boston.  In  1630,  Governor  Dudley  com- 
plains that  some  of  the  founders  of  New  England,  in  conse- 
quence of  a  famine,  were  obliged  to  set  free  one  hundred 
and  eighty  servants,  "  to  our  extreme  loss,"  for  they  httd 
cost  sixteen  or  twenty  pounds  a-piece.  Seventy  years  since, 
negro  slavery  prevailed  in  Massachusetts,  and  men  did  not 
blush  at  the  institution.  Think  of  the  treatment  which  the 
leaders  of  the  anti-slavery  reform  met  with  but  a  few  years 
ago,  and  you  see  what  a  progress  has  been  made  !* 

I  have  extenuated  nothing  of  our  condition  ;  I  have  said 
the  morals  of  trade  are  low  morals,  and  the  morals  of  the 
press  are  low ;  that  poverty  is  a  terrible  evil  to  deal  with, 
and  we  do  not  deal  with  it  manfully  ;  that  intemperance  is 
a  mournful  curse,  all  the  more  melancholy  when  rich  men 
purposely  encourage  it ;  that  here  is  an  amount  of  crime 
which  makes  us  shudder  to  think  of;  that  the  voice  of  human 
blood  cries  out  of  the  ground  against  us.  I  disguise  nothing 
of  all  this  ;  let  us  confess  the  fact,  and,  ugly  as  it  is,  look  it 
fairly  in  the  face.  Still,  our  moral  condition  is  better  than 
ever  before.  I  know  there  are  men  who  seem  born  with 
their  eyes  behind,  their  hopes  all  running  into  memory  ; 
some  who  wish  they  had  been  born  long  ago  :  they  might 
as  well ;  sure  it  is  no  fault  of  theirs  that  they  were  not.  I 
hear  what  they  have  to  tell  us.  Still,  on  the  whole,  the 
aspect  of  things  is  most  decidedly  encouraging  ;  for  if  so 
much  has  been  done  when  men  understood  the  matter  less 

*  This  statement  appears  somewhat  exaggerated  in  1851. 


292  SERMON    OF    THE 

than  we,  both  cause  and  cure,  how  much  more  can  be  done 
for  the  future  ? 

What  can  we  do  to  make  things  better  ? 

I  have  so  recently  spoken  of  poverty  that  I  shall  say  little 
now.  A  great  change  will  doubtless  take  place  before  many 
years  in  the  relations  between  capital  and  labor ;  a  great 
change  in  the  spirit  of  society.  I  do  not  believe  the  disparity 
now  existing  between  the  wealth  of  men  has  its  origin  in 
human  nature,  and  therefore  is  to  last  for  ever ;  I  do  not 
believe  it  is  just  and  right  that  less  than  one  twentieth  of  the 
people  in  the  nation  should  own  more  than  ten  twentieths  of 
the  property  of  the  nation,  unless  by  their  own  head,  or 
hands,  or  heart,  they  do  actually  create  and  earn  that 
amount.  I  am  not  now  blaming  any  class  of  men ;  only 
stating  a  fact.  There  is  a  profound  conviction  in  the  hearts 
of  many  good  men,  rich  as  well  as  poor,  that  things  are 
wrong;  that  there  is  an  ideal  right  for  the  actual  wrong;  but 
I  think  no  man  yet  has  risen  up  with  ability  to  point  out  for 
us  the  remedy  of  these  evils,  and  deliver  us  from  what  has 
not  badly  been  named  the  Feudalism  of  Capital.  Still,  with- 
out waiting  for  the  great  man  to  arise,  we  can  do  something 
with  our  littleness  even  now ;  the  truant  children  may  be 
snatched  from  vagrancy,  beggary,  and  ruin  ;  tenements  can 
be  built  for  the  poor,  and  rented  at  a  reasonable  rate.  It 
seems  to  me  that  something  more  can  be  done  in  the  way  of 
providing  employment  for  the  poor,  or  helping  them  to 
employment. 

In  regard  to  intemperance,  I  will  not  say  we  can  end  it  by 
direct  efforts.  So  long  as  there  is  misery  there  will  be 
continued  provocation  to  that  vice,  if  the  means  thereof  are 
within  reach.  I  do  not  believe  there  will  be  much  more 
intemperance  amongst  well-bred  men  ;  among  the  poor  and 
wretched  it  will  doubtless  long  continue.  But  if  we  cannot 
end,  we  can  diminish  it,  fast  as  we  will.  If  rich  men  did  not 
manufacture,  nor  import,  nor  sell ;  if  they  would  not  rent 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  293 

their  buildings  for  the  sale  of  intoxicating  liquor  for  improper 
uses  ;  if  they  did  not  by  their  example  favor  the  improper 
use  thereof,  how  long  do  you  think  your  police  would  arrest 
and  punish  one  thousand  drunkards  in  the  year?  how  long 
would  twelve  hundred  rum-shops  disgrace  your  town  ? 
Boston  is  far  more  sober,  at  least  in  appearance,  than  other 
large  cities  of  America,  but  it  is  still  the  head-quarters  of 
intemperance  for  the  State  of  Massachusetts.  In  arresting 
intemperance,  two  thirds  of  the  poverty,  three  fourths  of  the 
crime  of  this  city  would  end  at  once,  and  an  amount  of 
misery  and  sin  which  I  have  not  the  skill  to  calculate.  Do 
you  say  we  cannot  diminish  intemperance,  neither  by  law, 
nor  by  righteous  efforts  without  law  ?  Oh,  fie  upon  such 
talk.  Come,  let  us  be  honest,  and  say  we  do  not  wish  to, 
not  that  we  cannot.  It  is  plain  that  in  sixteen  years  we  can 
build  seven  great  railroads  radiating  out  of  Boston,  three  or 
four  hundred  miles  long;  that  we  can  conquer  the  Con- 
necticut and  the  Merrimack,  and  all  the  lesser  streams  of 
New  England ;  can  build  up  Lowell,  and  Chicopee,  and 
Lawrence ;  why,  in  four  years  Massachusetts  can  invest 
eight  and  fifty  millions  of  dollars  in  railroads  and  manufac- 
tures, and  cannot  prevent  intemperance  ;  cannot  diminish  it 
in  Boston  !  So  there  are  no  able  men  in  this  town  !  I  am 
amazed  at  such  talk,  in  such  a  place,  full  of  such  men, 
surrounded  by  such  trophies  of  their  work!  When  the 
churches  preach  and  men  believe  that  Mammon  is  not  the 
only  God  we  are  practically  to  serve ;  that  it  is  more  reputable 
to  keep  men  sober,  temperate,  comfortable,  intelligent,  and 
thriving,  than  it  is  to  make  money  out  of  other  men's  misery ; 
more  Christian  than  to  sell  and  manufacture  rum,  to  rent 
houses  for  the  making  of  drunkards  and  criminals,  then  we 
shall  set  about  this  business  with  the  energy  that  shows  we 
are  in  earnest,  and  by  a  method  which  will  do  the  work. 

In  the  matter  of  crime,  something  can  be  done  to  give 
efficiency  to  the  laws.    No  doubt  a  thorough  change  must  be 
made  in  the  idea  of  criminal  legislation ;  vengeance  must 
25* 


294  SERMON    OF    THE 

give  way  to  justice,  police-men  become  moral  missionaries, 
and  jails  moral  hospitals,  that  discharge  no  criminal  until  he 
is  cured.  It  will  take  long  to  get  the  idea  into  men's  minds. 
You  must  encounter  many  a  doubt,  many  a  sneer,  and 
expect  many  a  failure,  too.  Men  who  think  they  "  know 
the  world,"  because  they  know  that  most  men  are  selfish, 
will  not  believe  you.  We  must  wait  for  new  facts  to  con- 
vince such  men.  After  the  idea  is  established,  it  will  take 
long  to  organize  it  fittingly. 

Much  can  be  done  for  juvenile  offenders,  much  for  dis- 
charged convicts,  even  now.  We  can  pull  down  the  gal- 
lows, and  with  it  that  loathsome  theological  idea  on  which 
it  rests,  —  the  idea  of  a  vindictive  God.  A  remorseless 
court,  and  careful  police,  can  do  much  to  hinder  crime  ;  * 
but  they  cannot  remove  the  causes  thereof. 

Last  year,  a  good  man,  to  whom  the  State  was  deeply 
indebted  before,  suggested  that  a  moral  police  should  be 
appointed  to  look  after  offenders  ;  to  see  why  they  committed 
their  crime  ;  and  if  only  necessity  compelled  them,  to  seek 
out  for  them  some  employment,  and  so  remove  the  causes 
of  crime  in  detail.  The  thought  was  worthy  of  the  age, 
and  of  the  man.  In  the  hands  of  a  practical  man,  this 
thought  might  lead  to  good  results.  A  beginning  has  already 
been  made  in  the  right  direction,  by  establishing  the  State 
Reform  School  for  Boys.  It  will  be  easy  to  improve  on  this 
experiment,  and  conduct  prisons  for  men  on  the  same  scheme 
of  correction  and  cure,  not  merely  of  punishment,  in  the 
name  of  vengeance.  But,  after  all,  so  long  as  poverty, 
misery,  intemperance,  and  ignorance  continue,  no  civil 
police,  no  moral  police,  can  keep  such  causes  from  creating 
crime.  What  keeps  you  from  a  course  of  crime  ?  Your 


*  In  1847,  the  amount  of  goods  stolen  in  Boston,  and  reported  to 
the  police,  beyond  what  was  received,  was  more  than  $37,000 ;  in 
1848,  less  than  $11,000.  In  1849,  the  police  were  twice  as  numerous 
as  in  the  former  year,  and  organized  and  directed  with  new  and  re- 
markable skill. 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  295 

morality,  your  religion  ?  Is  it  ?  Take  away  your  proper- 
ty, your  home,  your  friends,  the  respect  of  respectable  men  ; 
take  away  what  you  have  received  from  education,  intellec- 
tual, moral,  and  religious,  and  how  much  better  would  the 
best  of  us  be  than  the  men  who  will  to-morrow  be  huddled 
off  to  jail,  for  crimes  committed  in  a  dram-shop  to-day  ? 
The  circumstances  which  have  kept  you  temperate,  industri- 
ous, respectable,  would  have  made  nine  tenths  of  the  men 
in  jail  as  good  men  as  you  are. 

It  is  not  pleasant  to  think  that  there  are  no  amusements 
which  lie  level  to  the  poor,  in  this  country.  In  Paris,  Naples, 
Rome,  Vienna,  Berlin,  there  are  cheap  pleasures  for  poor 
men,  which  yet  are  not  low  pleasures.  Here  there  are 
amusements  for  the  comfortable  and  the  rich,  not  too  nume- 
rous, rather  too  rare,  perhaps,  but  none  for  the  poor,  save 
only  the  vice  of  drunkenness ;  that  is  hideously  cheap  ;  the 
inward  temptation  powerful ;  the  outward  occasion  always 
at  hand.  Last  summer,  some  benevolent  men  treated  the 
poor  children  of  the  city  to  a  day  of  sunshine,  fresh  air, 
and  frolic  in  the  fields.  Once  a  year  the  children,  gathered 
together  by  another  benevolent  man,  have  a  floral  proces- 
sion in  the  streets ;  some  of  them  have  charitably  been 
taught  to  dance.  These  things  are  beautiful  to  think  of; 
signs  of  our  progress,  from  "  The  good  old  times,"  and 
omens  of  a  brighter  day,  when  Christianity  shall  bear  more 
abundantly  flowers  and  fruit  even  yet  more  fair. 

The  morals  of  the  current  literature,  of  the  daily  press  — 
you  can  change  when  you  will.  If  there  is  not  in  us  a  de- 
mand for  low  morals,  there  will  be  no  supply.  The  morals 
of  trade  and  of  politics,  the  handmaid  thereof,  we  can  make 
better  soon  as  we  wish. 

It  has  been  my  aim  to  give  suggestions,  rather  than  pro- 
pose distinct  plans  of  action ;  I  do  not  know  that  I  am  capa- 
ble of  that.  But  some  of  you  are  rich  men,  some  able  men  ; 
many  of  you,  I  think,  aro  good  men.  I  appeal  to  you  to 


296  SERMON    OF    THE 

do  something  to  raise  the  moral  character  of  this  town.  All 
that  has  been  done  in  fifty  years,  or  a  hundred  and  fifty, 
seems  very  little,  while  so  much  still  remains  to  do ;  only 
a  hint  and  an  encouragement.  You  cannot  do  much,  nor  I 
much  :  that  is  true.  But,  after  all,  every  thing  must  begin 
with  individual  men  and  women.  You  can  at  least  give  the 
example  of  what  a  good  man  ought  to  be  and  to  do,  to-day ; 
to-morrow  you  will  yourself  be  the  better  man  for  it.  So 
far  as  that  goes,  you  will  have  done  something  to  mend  the 
morals  of  Boston.  You  can  tell  of  actual  evils,  and  tell  of 
your  remedy  for  them  ;  can  keep  clear  from  committing 
the  evils  yourself:  that  also  is  something. 

Here  are  two  things  that  are  certain  :  We  are  all  brothers, 
rich  and  poor,  American  and  foreign  ;  put  here  by  jhe  same 
God,  for  the  same  end,  and  journeying  towards  the  same 
heaven,  owing  mutual  help.  Then,  too,  the  wise  men  and 
good  men  are  the  natural  guardians  of  society,  and  God  will 
not  hold  them  guiltless,  if  they  leave  their  brothers  to  perish. 
I  know  our  moral  condition  is  a  reproach  to  us ;  I  will  not 
deny  that,  nor  try  to  abate  the  shame  and  grief  we  should 
feel.  When  I  think  of  the  poverty  and  misery  in  the  midst 
of  us,  and  all  the  consequences  thereof,  I  hardly  dare  feel 
grateful  for  the  princely  fortunes  some  men  have  gathered 
together.  Certainly  it  is  not  a  Christian  society,  where  such 
extremes  exist ;  we  are  only  in  the  process  of  conversion  ; 
proselytes  of  the  gate,  and  not  much  more.  There  are 
noble  men  in  this  city,  who  have  been  made  philanthropic, 
by  the  sight  of  wrong,  of  intemperance,  and  poverty,  and 
crime.  Let  mankind  honor  great  conquerors,  who  only  rout 
armies,  and  "  plant  fresh  laurels  where  they  kill ;  "  I  honor 
most  the  men  who  contend  against  misery,  against  crime 
and  sin  ;  men  that  are  the  soldiers  of  humanity,  and  in  a 
low  age,  amidst  the  mean  and  sordid  spirits  of  a  great  trad- 
ing town,  lift  up  their  serene  foreheads,  and  tell  us  of  the 
right,  the  true,  first  good,  first  perfect,  and  first  fair.  From 
such  men  I  hear  the  prophecy  of  the  better  time  to  come. 


MORAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  297 

In  their  example  I  see  proofs  of  the  final  triumph  of  good 
over  evil.  Angels  are  they,  who  keep  the  tree  of  life,  not 
with  flaming  sword,  repelling  men,  but,  with  friendly  hand, 
plucking  therefrom,  and  giving  unto  all  the  leaves,  the 
flower,  and  the  fruit  of  life,  for  the  healing  of  the  nations. 
A  single  good  man,  kindling  his  early  flame,  wakens  the 
neighbors  with  his  words  of  cheer  ;  they,  at  his  lamp,  shall 
light  their  torch  and  household  fire,  anticipating  the  beamy 
warmth  of  day.  Soon  it  will  be  morning,  warm  and  light ; 
we  shall  be  up  and  a-doing,  and  the  lighted  lamp,  which 
seemed  at  first  too  much  for  eyes  to  bear,  will  look  ridicu- 
lous, and  cast  no  shadow  in  the  noonday  sun.  A  hundred 
years  hence,  men  will  stand  here  as  I  do  now,  and  speak  of 
the  evils  of  these  times  as  things  past  and  gone,  and  wonder 
that  able  men  could  ever  be  appalled  by  our  difficulties,  and 
think  them  not  to  be  surpassed.  Still,  all  depends  on  the 
faithfulness  of  men  —  your  faithfulness  and  mine. 

The  last  election  has  shown  us  what  resolute  men  can  do 
on  a  trifling  occasion,  if  they  will.  You  know  the  efforts  of 
the  three  parties — what  meetings  they  held,  what  money 
they  raised,  what  talent  was  employed,  what  speeches  made, 
what  ideas  set  forth :  not  a  town  was  left  unattempted ; 
scarce  a  man  who  had  wit  to  throw  a  vote,  but  his  vote  was 
solicited.  You  see  the  revolution  which  was  wrought  by 
that  vigorous  style  of  work.  When  such  men  set  about  re- 
forming the  evils  of  society,  with  such  a  determined  soul, 
what  evil  can  stand  against  mankind  ?  We  can  leave  noth- 
ing to  the  next  generation  worth  so  much  as  ideas  of  truth, 
justice,  and  religion,  organized  into  fitting  institutions  ;  such 
we  can  leave,  and,  if  true  men,  such  we  shall. 


XL 


A   SERMON  OF  THE  SPIRITUAL  CONDITION  OF  BOSTON.      PREACHED  AT 
THE  MELODEON,  ON   SUNDAY,  FEBRUARY   18,   1849. 


MATTHEW   VIII.    20. 


BT  THEIR   FRUITS   YE  SHALL   KNOW   THEM. 


LAST  Sunday  I  said  something  of  the  moral  condition  of 
Boston ;  to-day  I  ask  your  attention  to  a  Sermon  of  the 
Spiritual  Condition  of  Boston.  I  use  the  word  spiritual  in 
its  narrower  sense,  and  speak  of  the  condition  of  this  town 
in  respect  to  piety.  A  little  while  since,  in  a  sermon  of 
piety,  I  tried  to  show  that  love  of  God  lay  at  the  foundation 
of  all  manly  excellence,  and  was  the  condition  of  all  noble, 
manly  development ;  that  love  of  truth,  love  of  justice,  love 
of  love,  were  respectively  the  condition  of  intellectual, 
moral,  and  affectional  development,  and  that  they  were  also 
respectively  the  intellectual,  moral,  and  affectional  forms  of 
piety  ;  that  the  love  of  God  as  the  Infinite  Father,  the  total- 
ity of  truth,  justice,  and  love  was  the  general  condition  of 
the  total  development  of  man's  spiritual  powers.  But  I 
showed,  that  sometimes  this  piety,  intellectual,  moral,  affec- 
tional or  total,  did  not  arrive  at  self-consciousness  ;  the  man 
only  unconsciously  loving  the  Infinite  in  one  or  all  these 
modes,  and  in  such  cases  the  man  was  a  loser  by  frustrating 
his  piety,  and  allowing  it  to  stop  in  the  truncated  form  of 
unconsciousness. 

Now  what  is  in  you  will  appear  out  of  you ;  if  piety  be 


SPIRITUAL,    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  299 

there  in  any  of  these  forms,  in  either  mode,  it  will  come 
out ;  if  not  there,  its  fruits  cannot  appear.  You  may  reason 
forward  or  backward  :  if  you  know  piety  exists,  you  may 
foretell  its  appearance  ;  if  you  find  fruits  thereof,  you  may 
reason  back  and  be  sure  of  its  existence.  Piety  is  love  of 
God  as  God,  and  as  we  only  love  what  we  are  like,  and  in 
that  degree,  so  it  is  also  a  likeness  to  God.  Now  it  is  a 
general  doctrine  in  Christendom  that  divinity  must  manifest 
itself;  and,  in  assuming  the  highest  form  of  manifestation 
known  to  us,  divinity  becomes  humanity.  However,  that 
doctrine  is  commonly  taught  in  the  specific  and  not  generic 
form,  and  is  enforced  by  an  historical  and  concrete  example, 
but  not  by  way  of  a  universal  thesis.  It  appears  thus  :  The 
Christ  was  God;  as  such  He  must  manifest  himself;  the 
form  of  manifestation  was  that  of  a  complete  and  perfect 
man.  I  reject  the  concrete  example,  but  accept  the  univer- 
sal doctrine  on  which  the  special  dogma  of  the  Trinity  is 
erected.  From  that  I  deduce  this  as  a  general  rule  :  If  you 
follow  the  law  of  your  nature,  and  are  simple  and  true  to 
that,  as  much  of  godhood  as  there  is  in  you,  so  much  of 
manhood  will  come  out  of  you,  and,  as  much  of  manhood 
comes  out  of  you,  so  much  of  godhood  was  there  within  you  ; 
as  much  subjective  divinity,  so  much  objective  humanity. 

Such  being  the  case,  the  demands  you  can  make  on  a  man 
for  manliness  must  depend  for  their  answer  on  the  amount 
of  piety  on  deposit  in  his  character;  so  it  becomes  impor- 
tant to  know  the  condition  of  this  town  in  respect  of  piety, 
for  if  this  be  not  right  in  the  above  sense,  nothing  else  is 
right ;  or,  to  speak  more  clerically,  "  Unless  the  Lord  keep 
the  city,  the  watchman  waketh  but  in  vain,"  and  unless 
piety  be  developed  or  a-developing  in  men,  it  is  vain  for  the 
minister  to  sit  up  late  of  a  Saturday  night  to  concoct  his  ser- 
mon, and  to  rise  up  early  of  a  Sunday  morning  to  preach  the 
same  ;  he  fights  but  as  one  that  beateth  the  air,  and  spends 
his  strength  for  that  which  is  nought.  They  are  in  the  right, 
therefore,  who  first  of  all  things  demand  piety  :  so  let  us  see 


300  SERMON    OF    THE 

what  signs  or  proof  we  have,  and  of  what  amount  of  piety 
in  Boston. 

To  determine  this,  we  must  have  some  test  by  which  to 
judge  of  the  quality,  distinguishing  piety  from  impiety,  and 
some  standard  whereby  to  measure  the  quantity  thereof ; 
for  though  you  may  know  what  piety  is  in  you,  I  what  is  in 
me,  and  God  what  is  in  both  and  in  all  the  rest  of  us,  it  is 
plain  that  we  can  only  judge  of  the  existence  of  piety  in 
other  men,  and  measure  its  quantity  by  an  outward  mani- 
festation thereof,  in  some  form  which  shall  serve  at  once  as 
a  trial  test  and  a  standard  measure. 

Now,  then,  as  I  mentioned  in  that  former  sermon,  it  is  on 
various  sides  alleged  that  there  are  two  outward  manifesta- 
tions of  piety,  a  good  deal  unlike  :  each  is  claimed  by  some 
men  as  the  exclusive  trial  test  and  standard  measure.  Let 
me  say  a  word  of  each. 

I.  Some  contend  for  what  I  call  the  conventional  standard  ; 
that  is,  the  manifestation  of  piety  by  means  of  certain  pre- 
scribed forms.     Of  these  forms  there  are  three   modes  or 

+ 

degrees  :  namely,  first,  the  form  of  bodily  attendance  on 
public  worship ;  second,  the  belief  in  certain  doctrines,  not 
barely  because  they  are  proven  true,  or  known  without 
proof,  but  because  they  are  taught  with  authority  ;  and  third, 
a  passive  acquiescence  in  certain  forms  and  ceremonies,  or 
an  active  performance  thereof. 

II.  The  other  I  call  the  natural  standard  ;  that  is,  the  man- 
ifestation  of  piety  in  the  natural  form  of  morality  in  its 
various  degrees  and  modes  of  action. 

It  is  plain,  that  the  amount  of  piety  in  a  man  or  a  town, 
will  appear  very  different  when  tested  by  one  or  the  other 
of  these  standards.  It  may  be  that  very  little  water  runs 
through  the  wooden  trough  which  feeds  the  saw-mill  at 
Niagara,  and  yet  a  good  deal,  blue  and  bounding,  may  leap 
over  the  rock,  adown  its  natural  channel.  In  a  matter  of 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  301 

this  importance,  when  taking  account  of  a  stock  so  precious 
as  piety,  it  is  but  fair  to  try  it  by  both  standards. 

Let  us  begin  with  the  conventional  standard,  and  examine 
piety  by  its  manifestation  in  the  ecclesiastical  forms.  Here 
is  a  difficulty  at  the  outset,  in  determining  upon  the  measure, 
for  there  is  no  one  and  general  ecclesiastical  standard,  com- 
mon to  all  parties  of  Christians,  from  the  Catholic  to  the 
Quaker  ;  each  measures  by  its  own  standard,  but  denies  the 
correctness  of  all  the  others.  It  is  as  if  a  foot  were  declared 
the  unit  of  long  measure,  and  then  the  actual  foot  of  the 
chief  justice  of  a  State,  were  taken  as  the  rule  by  which  to 
correct  all  measurements ;  then  the  foot  would  vary  as  you 
went  from  North  Carolina  to  South,  and,  in  any  one  State, 
would  vary  with  the  health  of  the  judge.  However,  to  do 
what  can  be  done  with  a  measure  thus  uncertain,  it  is  plain, 
that,  estimated  by  any  ecclesiastical  standard,  the  amount  of 
piety  is  small.  There  is,  as  men  often  say,  u  A  general  de- 
cline of  piety  ;  "  that  is  a  common  complaint,  recorded  and 
registered.  But  what  makes  the  matter  worse  to  the  eccle- 

D  ff~ 

siastical  philosopher,  and  more  appalling  to  the  complainers, 
is  this  :  it  is  a  decline  of  long  standing.  The  disease  which 
is  thus  lamented  is  said  to  be  acute,  but  is  proved  to  be 
chronic  also  ;  only  it  would  seem,  from  the  lamentations  of 
some  modern  Jeremiahs,  that  the  decline  went  on  with  ac- 
celerated velocity,  and,  the  more  chronic  the  disease  was, 
the  acuter  it  also  became. 

Tried  by  this  standard,  things  seem  discouraging.  To 
get  a  clearer  view,  let  us  look  a  little  beyond  our  own  bor- 
ders, at  first,  and  then  come  nearer  home.  The  Catholic 
church  complains  of  a  general  defection.  The  majority  of 
the  Christian  church  confesses  that  the  Protestant  Reforma- 
tion was  not  a  revival  of  religion,  not  a  "  Great  awakening," 
but  a  great  falling  to  sleep ;  the  faith  of  Luther  and  Calvin 
was  a  great  decline  of  religion  —  a  decline  of  piety  in  the 
ecclesiastical  form  ;  that  modern  philosophy,  the  physics  of 
26 


302  SERMON    Or    THE 

Galileo  and  Newton,  the  metaphysics  of  Descartes  and  of 
Kant,  mark  another  decline  of  religion  —  a  decline  of  piety 
in  the  philosophical  form  ;  that  all  the  modern  democracy 
of  the  eighteenth  and  nineteenth  centuries,  marks  a  yet  fur- 
ther decline  of  religion  —  a  decline  of  piety  in  the  political 
form  ;  that  all  the  modern  secular  societies,  for  removing  the 
evils  of  men  and  their  sins,  mark  a  yet  fourth  decline  of 
religion  —  a  decline  of  piety  in  the  philanthropic  form. 
Certainly,  when  measured  by  the  mediaeval  standard  of 
Catholicism,  these  mark  four  great  declensions  of  piety,  for, 
in  all  four,  the  old  principle  of  subordination  to  an  external 
and  personal  authority  is  set  aside. 

All  over  Europe  this  decline  is  still  going  on ;  ecclesias- 
tical establishments  are  breaking  down ;  other  establish- 
ments are  a-building  up.  Pius  the  Ninth  seems  likely  to 
fulfil  his  own  prophecy,  and  be  the  last  of  the  Popes  ;  I 
mean  the  last  with  temporal  power.  There  is  a  great  schism 
in  the  north  of  Europe  ;  the  Germans  will  be  Catholics,  but 
no  longer  Roman.  The  old  forms  of  piety,  such  as  service 
in  Latin,  the  withholding  of  the  Bible  from  the  people,  com- 
pulsory confession,  the  ungrateful  celibacy  of  a  reluctant 
priesthood  —  all  these  are  protested  against.  It  is  of  no 
avail  that  the  holy  coat  of  Jesus,  at  Treves,  works  greater 
miracles  than  the  apostolical  napkins  and  aprons  ;  of  no  avail 
that  the-  Virgin  Mary  appeared  on  the  nineteenth  of  Septem- 
ber, 1846,  to  two  shepherd-children,  at  La  Salette,  in  France. 
What  are  such  things  to  Ronge  and  Wessenberg  ?  Neither 
the  miraculous  coat,  nor  the  miraculous  mother,  avails  aught 
against  this  untoward  generation,  charm  they  never  so  wisely. 
The  decline  of  piety  goes  on.  By  the  new  Constitution  of 
France,  all  forms  of  religion  are  equal ;  the  Catholic  and 
the  Protestant,  the  Mahometan  and  the  Jew,  are  equally 
sheltered  under  the  broad  shield  of  the  law.  Even  Spain, 
the  fortress  walled  and  moated  about,  whither  the  spirit  of 
the  middle  ages  retired  and  shut  herself  up  long  since, 
womanning  her  walls  with  unmanly  priests  and  kings,  with 


SPIRITUAL.    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  303 

unfeminine  queens  and  nuns  —  even  Spain  fails  with  the 
general  failure.  British  capitalists  buy  up  her  convents  and 
nunneries,  to  turn  them  into  woollen  mills.  Monks  and 
nuns  forget  their  beads  in  some  new  handicraft ;  sister  Mary, 
who  sat  still  in  the  house,  is  now  also  busy  with  serving, 
careful,  indeed,  about  more  things  than  formerly,  but  not 
cumbered  nor  troubled  as  before.  Meditative  Rachels,  and 
Hannahs,  long  unblest,  who  sat  in  solitude,  have  now  become 
like  practical  Dorcas,  making  garments  for  the  poor ;  the 
Bank  is  become  more  important  than  the  Inquisition.  The 
order  of  St.  Francis  d'Assisi,  of  St.  Benedict,  even  of  St. 
Dominic  himself,  is  giving  way  before  the  new  order  of 
Arkwright,  Watt,  and  Fulton, — the  order  of  the  spinning 
jenny  and  the  power-loom.  It  is  no  longer  books  on  the 
miraculous  conception,  or  meditations  on  the  five  wounds  of 
the  Saviour,  or  commentaries  on  the  song  of  songs  which 
is  Solomon's,  that  get  printed  there  :  but  fiery  novels  of 
Eugene  Sue,  and  George  Sand  ;  and  so  extremes  meet. 

Protestant  establishments  share  the  same  peril.  A  new 
sect  of  Protestants  rises  up  in  Germany,  who  dissent  as 
much  from  the  letter  and  spirit  of  Protestantism,  as  the 
Protestants  from  Catholicism  ;  men  that  will  not  believe  the 
infallibility  of  the  Bible,  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  the 
depravity  of  man,  the  eternity  of  future  punishment,  nor 
justification  by  faith — a  justification  before  God,  for  mere 
belief  before  men.  The  new  spirit  gets  possession  of  new 
men,  who  cannot  be  written  down,  nor  even  howled  down. 
Excommunication  or  abuse  does  no  good  on  such  men  as 
Bauer,  Strauss,  and  Schwegler ;  and  it  answers  none  of  their 
questions.  It  seems  pretty  clear,  that  in  all  the  north  of 
Germany,  within  twenty  years,  there  will  be  entire  freedom 
of  worship,  for  all  sects,  Protestant  and  Catholic. 

In  England,  Protestanism  has  done  its  work  less  faithfully 
than  in  Germany.  The  Protestant  spirit  of  England  came 
here  two  hundred  years  ago,  so  that  new  and  Protestant 
England  is  on  the  west  of  the  ocean ;  in  England,  an  estab- 


304  SERMON    OF    THE 

lished  church  lies  there  still,  an  iceberg  in  the  national 
garden.  But  even  there,  the  decline  of  the  ecclesiastical 
form  of  piety  is  apparent:  the  new  bishops  must  not  sit  in 
the  House  of  Lords,  till  the  old  ones  die  out,  for  the  number 
of  lords  spiritual  must  not  increase,  though  the  temporal 
may  ;  the  new  attempt,  at  Oxford  and  elsewhere,  to  restore 
the  Middle  Ages,  will  not  prosper.  Bring  back  all  the  old 
rites  and  forms  into  Leeds  and  Manchester ;  teach  men 
the  theology  of  Thomas  Aquinas,  or  of  St.  Bernard  ;  bid 
them  adore  the  uplifted  wafer,  as  the  very  God,  men  who 
toil  all  day  with  iron  mills,  who  ride  in  steam-drawn  coaches, 
and  talk  by  lightning  in  a  whisper,  from  the  Irk  to  the 
Thames,  —  they  will  not  consent  to  the  philosophy  or  the 
theology  of  the  Middle  Ages,  nor  be  satisfied  with  the  old 
forms  of  piety,  which,  though  too  elevated  for  their  fathers 
in  the  time  of  Elizabeth,  are  yet  too  low  for  them,  at  least 
too  antiquated.  Dissenters  have  got  into  the  House  of  Com- 
mons ;  the  test-act  is  repealed,  and  a  man  can  be  a  captain 
in  the  army,  or  a  post-master  in  a  village,  without  first  tak- 
ing the  Lord's  Supper,  after  the  fashion  of  the  Church  of 
England.  Some  men  demand  the  abandonment  of  tithes, 
the  entire  separation  of  Church  and  State,  the  return  to  "  The 
voluntary  principle"  in  religion.  "  The  battering  ram  which 
levelled  old  Sarum,"  and  other  boroughs  as  corrupt,  now 
beats  on  the  church,  and  the  "  Church  is  in  danger."  Men 
complain  of  the  decline  of  piety  in  England.  An  intelli- 
gent and  very  serious  writer,  not  long  ago,  lamenting  this 
decline,  in  proof  thereof,  relates,  that  formerly  men  began 
their  last  wills,  "  In  the  name  of  God,  Amen  ; "  and  headed 
bills  of  lading  with,  "  Shipped  in  good  order,  by  the  grace 
of  God ;  "  that  indictments  for  capital  crimes  charged  the 
culprit  with  committing  felony,  "At  the  instigation  of  the 
devil,"  and  now,  he  complains,  these  forms  have  gone  out 
of  use. 

In  America,  in  New  England,  in  Boston,  when  measured 
by  that  standard,  the  same  decline  of  piety  is  apparent.     It 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  305 

is  often  said  that  our  material  condition  is  better  than  our 
moral ;  that  in  advance  of  our  spiritual  condition.  There  is 
a  common  clerical  complaint  of  a  certain  thinness  in  the 
churches ;  men  do  not  give  their  bodily  attendance,  as  once 
they  did  ;  they  are  ready  enough  to  attend  lectures,  two  or 
three  in  a  week,  no  matter  how  scientific  and  abstract,  or 
how  little  connected  with  their  daily  work,  yet  they  cannot 
come  to  the  church  without  teasing  beforehand,  nor  keep 
awake  while  there.  It  is  said  the  minister  is  not  respected 
as  formerly.  True,  a  man  of  power  is  respected,  heard, 
sought  and  followed,  but  it  is  for  his  power,  for  his  words  of 
grace  and  truth,  not  for  his  place  in  a  pulpit ;  he  may  have 
more  influence  as  a  man,  but  less  as  a  clergyman. '  Minis- 
ters lament  a  prevalent  disbelief  of  their  venerable  doc- 
trines ;  that  there  is  a  concealed  skepticism  in  regard  to 
them,  often  not  concealed.  This,  also,  is  a  well-founded 
complaint ;  the  well  known  dogmas  of  theology  were  never 
in  worse  repute  ;  there  was  never  so  large  a  portion  of  the 
community  in  New  England  who  were  doubtful  of  the  Trin- 
ity, of  eternal  damnation,  of  total  depravity,  of  the  atone- 
ment, of  the  Godhead  of  Jesus,  of  the  miracles  of  the  New 
Testament,  and  of  the  truth  of  every  word  of  the  Bible.  A 
complaint  is  made,  that  the  rites  and  forms  which  are  some- 
times called  "  the  ordinances  of  religion,"  are  neglected ; 
that  few  men  join  the  church,  and  though  the  old  hedge  is 
broken  down  before  the  altar,  yet  the  number  of  communi- 
cants diminishes,  and  it  is  no  longer  able-headed  men,  the 
leaders  of  society,  who  come ;  that  the  ordinances  seem 
haggard  and  ghastly  to  young  men,  who  cannot  feed  their 
hungry  souls  on  such  a  thin  pittance  of  spiritual  aliment  as 
these  afford  ;  that  the  children  are  not  baptized.  These 
things  are  so ;  so  in  Europe,  Catholic  and  Protestant ;  so  in 
America,  so  in  Boston.  Notwithstanding  the  well-founded 
complaint  that  our  modern  churches  are  too  costly  for  the 
times,  we  do  not  build  temples  which  bear  so  high  a  propor- 
tion to  our  wealth  as  the  early  churches  of  Boston  ;  the 
26* 


306  SERMON    OF    THE 

attendance  at  meeting  does  not  increase  as  the  population ; 
the  ministers  are  not  prominent,  as  in  the  days  of  Wilson, 
of  Cotton,  and  of  Norton ;  their  education  is  not  now  in 
the  same  proportion  to  the  general  culture  of  the  times. 
Harvard  College,  dedicated  to  "  Christ  and  the  Church," 
designed  at  first  chiefly  for  the  education  of  the  clergy, 
graduates  few  ministers ;  theological  literature  no  longer 
overawes  all  other.  The  number  of  church  members  was 
never  so  small  in  proportion  to  the  voters  as  now ;  the  num- 
ber of  Protestant  births  never  so  much  exceeded  the  number 
of  Protestant  baptisms.  Young  men  of  superior  ability  and 
superior  education  have  little  affection  for  the  ministry ; 
take  little  interest  in  the  welfare  of  the  Church.  Nay, 
youths  descended  from  a  wealthy  family  seldom  look  that 
way.  It  is  poor  men's  sons,  men  of  obscure  family,  who 
fill  the  pulpits  ;  often,  likewise,  men  of  slender  ability,  eked 
out  with  an  education  -proportionately  scant.  The  most 
active  members  of  the  churches  are  similar  in  position, 
ability  and  culture.  These  are  undeniable  facts.  They  are 
not  peculiar  to  New  England.  You  find  them  wherever 
the  voluntary  principle  is  resorted  to.  In  England,  in 
Catholic  countries,  you  find  the  old  historic  names  in  the 
Established  Church ;  there  is  no  lack  of  aristocratic  blood 
in  clerical  veins ;  but  there  and  everywhere  the  church 
seems  falling  astern  of  all  other  craft  which  can  keep  the 
sea. 

Since  these  things  are  so,  men  who  have  only  the  con- 
ventional standard  wherewith  to  measure  the  amount  of 
piety,  only  that  test  to  prove  its  existence  by,  think  we  are 
rapidly  going  to  decay ;  that  the  tabernacle  is  fallen  down, 
and  no  man  rises  to  set  it  up.  They  complain  that  Zion  is 
in  distress ;  theological  newspapers  lament  that  there  are  no 
revivals  to  report ;  that  "  The  Lord  has  withheld  His  arm," 
and  does  not  "  pour  out  His  Spirit  upon  the  churches." 
Ghastly  meetings  are  held  by  men  with  sincere  and  noble 
heart,  but  saddened  face ;  speeches  are  made  which  seem  a 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  307 

groan  of  linked  wailings  long  drawn  out.  Men  mourn 
at  the  infidelity  of  the  times,  at  the  coldness  of  some,  at 
the  deadness  of  others.  All  the  sects  complain  of  this, 
yet  each  loves  to  attribute  the  deadness  of  the  rival  sects 
to  their  special  theology  ;  it  is  Unitarianism  which  is  chok- 
ing the  Unitarians,  say  their  foes,  and  the  Unitarians  know 
how  to  retort  after  the  same  fashion.  The  less  enlightened 
put  the  blame  of  this  misfortune  on  the  good  God  who  has 
somehow  "  withheld  His  hand,"  or  omitted  to  "  pour  out 
His  Spirit," — the  people  perishing  for  want  of  the  open 
vision.  Others  put  the  blame  on  mankind  ;  some  on  "  poor 
human  nature,"  which  is  not  what  might  have  been  ex* 
pected,  not  perceiving  that  if  the  fault  be  there  it  is  not 
for  us  to  remedy,  and  if  God  made  man  a  bramble-bush, 
that  no  wailing  will  make  him  bear  figs.  Yet  others  refer 
this  condition  to  the  use  made  of  human  nature,  which 
certainly  is  a  more  philosophical  way  of  looking  at  the 
matter. 

Now  there  is  one  sect  which  has  done  great  service  in 
former  days,  which  is,  1  think,  still  doing  something  to 
enlighten  and  liberalize  the  land,  and,  I  trust,  will  yet  do 
more,  more  even  than  it  consciously  intends.  The  name  of 
Unitarian  is  deservedly  dear  to  many  of  us,  who  y"et  will 
not  be  shackled  by  any  denominational  fetters.  This  sect 
has  always  been  remarkable  for  a  certain  gentlemanly 
reserve  about  all  that  pertained  to  the  inward  part  of  reli- 
gion ;  other  faults  it  might  have,  but  it  did  not  incur  the 
reproach  of  excessive  enthusiasm,  -or  a  spirituality  too 
sublimated  and  transcendental  for  daily  use.  This  sect  has 
long  been  a  speckled  bird  among  the  denominations,  each 
of  which  has  pecked  at  her,  or  at  least  cawed  with  most 
unmelodious  croak  against  this  new  fledged  sect.  It  was 
said  the  Unitarians  had  "  denied  the  Lord  that  bought 
them;"  that  theirs  was  the  church  of  unbelief — not  the 
church  of  Christ,  but  of  No-Christ ;  that  they  had  a  Bible 
of  their  own,  and  a  thin,  poor  Bible,  too  :  that  their  ways 


308  SERMON    OF    THE 

were  ways  of  destruction ;  "  Touch  not,  taste  not,  handle 
not,"  was  to  be  written  on  their  doctrines ;  that  they  had 
not  even  the  grace  of  lukewarmness,  but  were  moral  and 
stone-cold  ;  that  they  looked  fair  on  the  side  turned  towards 
man,  but  on  the  Godward  side  it  was  a  blank  wall  with  no 
gate,  nor  window,  nor  loophole,  nor  eyelet  for  the  Holy 
Ghost  to  come  through  ;  that  their  prayers  were  only  a  snow 
of  devotion  to  cover  up  the  hard  rock  of  the  flinty  heart,  or 
the  frozen  ground  of  morality.  Their  faith,  it  was  said, 
was  only  a  conviction  after  the  case  was  proven  by  unim- 
peachable evidence,  and  good  for  nothing;  while  belief 
without  evidence,  or  against  proof,  seems  to  be  the  right 
ecclesiastical  talisman. 

For  a  long  time  the  Unitarian  sect  did  not  grumble  unduly, 
but  set  itself  to  promote  the  cultivation  of  reason  and  apply 
that  to  religion  ;  to  cultivate  morality  and  apply  it  to  life  ; 
and  to  demand  the  most  entire  personal  freedom  for  all  men 
in  all  matters  pertaining  to  religion.  Hence  came  its 
merits  ;  they  were  very  great  merits,  too,  and  not  at  all  the 
merits  of  the  times,  held  in  common  with  the  other  sects. 
I  need  not  dwell  on  this,  and  the  good  works  of  Unitari- 
anism,  in  this  the  most  Unitarian  city  in  the  world  ;  but  as  a 
general  thing  the  Unitarians,  it  seems  to  me,  did  neglect  the 
culture  of  piety  ;  and  of  course  their  morality,  while  it 
lasted,  would  be  unsatisfactory,  and  in  time  would  wither 
and  dry  up,  because  it  had  no  deepness  of  earth  to  grow  out 
of.  The  Unitarians,  as  a  general  thing,  began  outside,  and 
sought  to  work  inward,  proceeding  from  the  special  to  the 
general,  by  what  might  be  called  the  inductive  mode  of 
religious  culture ;  that  was  the  form  adopted  in  pulpits,  and 
in  families  so  far  as  there  was  any  religious  education 
attempted  in  private.  That  is  not  the  method  of  nature, 
where  all  growth  is  the  development  of  a  living  germ,  which 
by  an  inward  power  appropriates  the  outward  things  it 
needs,  and  grows  thereby.  Hence  came  the  defects  of 
Unitarianism,  and  they  were  certainly  very  great  defects ; 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  309 

but  they  came  almost  unavoidably  from  the  circumstances  of 
the  times.  The  sensational  philosophy  was  the  only  philo- 
sophy that  prevailed  ;  the  Orthodox  sects  had  always  re- 
jected a  part  of  that  philosophy,  not  in  the  name  of  science, 
but  of  piety,  and  they  supplied  its  place  not  with  a  better 
philosophy,  but  with  tradition,  speaking  with  an  authority 
which  claimed  to  be  above  human  nature.  It  was  not  in  the 
name  of  reason  that  they  rejected  a  false  philosophy,  but  in 
the  name  of  religion  often  denounced  all  philosophy  and  the 
reason  which  demanded  it.  The  Unitarians  rejected  that 
portion  of  Orthodoxy,  became  more  consistent  sensation- 
alists, and  arrived  at  results  which  we  know.  Now  it  is 
easy  to  see  their  error ;  not  difficult  to  avoid  it ;  but  forty  or 
fifty  years  ago  it  was  almost  impossible  not  to  fall  into  this 
mistake.  Sometimes  it  seems  as  if  the  Unitarians  were 
half  conscious  of  this  defect,  and  so  dared  not  be  original, 
but  borrowed  Orthodox  weapons,  or  continued  to  use  Trini- 
tarian phrases  long  after  they  had  blunted  those  weapons  of 
their  point,  and  emptied  the  phrases  of  their  former  sense. 
In  the  controversy  between  the  Orthodox  and  Unitarians, 
neither  party  was  wholly  right :  the  Unitarians  had  reason  to 
charge  the  Orthodox  with  debasing  man's  nature,  and  repre- 
senting God  as  not  only  unworthy,  but  unjust,  and  somewhat 
odious ;  the  Trinitarians  were  mainly  right  in  charging  us 
with  want  of  conscious  piety,  with  beginning  to  work  at  the 
wrong  end  ;  but  at  the  same  time  it  must  be  remembered, 
that,  in  proportion  to  their  numbers,  the  Unitarians  have 
furnished  far  more  philanthropists  and  reformers  than  any 
of  the  other  sects.  It  is  time  to  confess  this  on  both 
sides. 

For  a  long  time  the  Unitarian  sect  did  not  complain  much 
of  the  decline  of  piety ;  it  did  not  care  to  have  an  organi- 
zation, loving  personal  freedom  too  well  for  that,  and  it  had 
not  much  denominational  feeling  ;  indeed,  its  members  were 
kept  together,  not  so  much  by  an  agreement  and  unity  of 
opinion  among  themselves,  as  by  a  unity  of  opposition  from 


310  SERMON    OF    THE 

without ;  it  was  not  the  hooks  on  their  shields  that  held  the 
legion  together  with  even  front,  but  the  pressure  of  hostile 
shields  crowded  upon  them  from  all  sides.  They  did  not 
believe  in  spasmodic  action  ;  if  a  body  was  dead,  they  gave 
it  burial,  without  trying  to  galvanize  it  into  momentary  life, 
not  worth  the  spark  it  cost ;  they  knew  that  a  small  cloud 
may  make  a  good  many  flashes  in  the  dark,  but  that  many 
lightnings  cannot  make  light.  They  stood  apart  from  the 
violent  efforts  of  other  churches  to  get  converts.  The  con- 
verts they  got  commonly  adhered  to  their  faith,  and  in  this 
respect  differed  a  good  deal  from  those  whom  "  Revivals  " 
brought  into  other  churches  ;  with  whom  Christianity  sprung 
up  in  a  night,  and  in  a  night  also  perished.  Some  years 
ago,  when  this  city  was  visited  and  ravaged  by  Revivals,  the 
Unitarians  kept  within  doors,  gave  warning  of  the  danger, 
and  suffered  less  harm  and  loss  from  that  tornado  than  any 
of  the  sects.  Unitarianism  seems,  in  this  city,  to  have  done 
its  original  work ;  so  the  company  is  breaking  up  by 
degrees,  and  the  men  are  going  off,  to  engage  in  other 
business,  to  weed  other  old  fields,  or  to  break  up  new  land, 
each  man  following  his  own  sense  of  duty,  and  for  himself 
determining  whether  to  go  or  stay.  But  at  the  same  time, 
an  attempt  is  made  to  keep  the  company  together  ;  to 
cultivate  a  denominational  feeling  ;  to  put  hooks  and  staples 
on  the  shields  which  no  longer  offer  that  formidable  and 
even  front ;  to  teach  all  trumpets  to  give  the  same  sectarian 
bray,  all  voices  to  utter  the  same  war-cry.  The  attempt 
does  not  succeed  ;  the  ranks  are  disordered,  the  trumpets 
give  an  uncertain  sound,  and  the  soldiers  do  not  prepare 
themselves  for  denominational  battle  ;  nay,  it  often  happens 
that  the  camp  lacks  the  two  sinews  of  war  —  both  money 
and  men.  Hence  the  denominational  view  of  religious 
affairs  has  undergone  a  change  ;  I  make  no  doubt  a  real  and 
sincere  change,  though  I  know  this  has  been  denied,  and  the 
change  thought  only  official.  The  men  I  refer  to  are  sin- 
cere and  devout  men;  some  of  them  quite  above  the 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  311 

suspicion  of  mere  official  conduct.  This  sect  is  now  the 
loudest  in  its  wailing ;  these  Christian  Jeremiahs  tell  us  that 
we  do  not  realize  spiritual  things,  that  we  are  all  dead  men, 
that  there  is  no  health  in  us.  These  cold  Unitarian  Thomases 
crowd  unwontedly  together  in  public  to  bewail  the  spiritual 
weather,  the  dearth  of  piety  in  Boston,  the  "  General  decline 
of  religion  "  in  New  England.  Church  unto  church  raises 
the  Macedonian  cry,  "  Come  over  and  help  us ! "  The 
opinion  seems  general  that  piety  is  in  a  poor  way,  and  must 
have  watchers,  the  strongest  medicine,  and  nursing  quite 
unusual,  or  it  will  soon  be  all  over,  and  Unitarianism  will 
give  up  the  ghost.  Various  causes  have  I  heard  assigned 
for  the  malady  :  some  think  that  there  has  been  over-much 
preaching  of  philosophy,  though  perhaps  there  is  not  evi- 
dence to  convict  any  one  man  in  particular  of  the  offence  ; 
that  philosophy  is  the  dog  in  the  manger,  who  keeps  the 
hungry  Unitarian  flock  from  their  spiritual  hay  and  cut- 
straw,  which  are  yet  of  not  the  smallest  use  to  him.  But 
look  never  so  sharp,  and  you  do  not  find  this  dangerous 
beast  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  fold.  Others  think  that 
there  has  been  also  an  excess  of  moral  preaching,  against 
the  prevalent  sins  of  the  nation,  1  suppose  —  but  few  indi- 
viduals seem  liable  to  conviction  on  that  charge.  Yet  others 
think  this  decline  comes  from  the  fact  that  the  terrors  have 
not  been  duly  and  sufficiently  administered  from  the  pulpit; 
that  while  Catholics  and  Methodists  thrive  under  such  in- 
fluences, the  Unitarian  widows  are  neglected  in  the  weekly 
ministration  of  terror  and  of  threat ;  that  there  has  not  been 
so  much  an  excess  of  lightning  in  the  form  of  philosophy  or 
morality,  but  only  a  lack  of  thunder. 

This  temporary  movement  among  the  Unitarians  of  Bos- 
ton is  natural ;  in  some  respects  it  is  what  our  fathers  would 
have  called  "judicial."  The  Unitarians  have  been  cold, 
have  looked  more  at  the  outward  manifestations  of  goodness 
than  at  the  inward  spirit  of  piety  which  was  to  make  the 
manifestations ;  they  have  not  had  an  excess  of  philosophy, 


312  SERMON    OF    THE 

or  of  morality,  but  a  defect  of  piety.  They  have  been  more 
respectable  than  pious.  They  have  not  always  quite  rightly 
appreciated  the  enthusiasm  of  sterner  and  more  austere 
sects ;  not  always  done  justice  to  the  inwardness  of  religion 
those  sects  sought  to  promote.  When  their  churches  get  a 
little  thin,  and  their  denominational  affairs  a  little  disturbed, 
it  is  quite  natural  these  Unitarians  should  look  after  the 
cause  and  pass  over  to  lamentations  at  the  present  state  of 
things  ;  while  looking  at  the  community  from  the  new  point 
of  view,  it  is  quite  natural  that  they  should  suppose  piety  on 
the  decline,  and  religion  dying  out.  Yes,  in  general  it  is 
plain  that,  if  men  have  no  eyes  but  conventional  eyes,  no 
spirit  but  that  of  the  ecclesiastical  order  they  serve  in,  and  of 
the  denomination  they  belong  to,  it  is  natural  for  them  to 
think  that  because  piety  does  not  flow  in  the  old  ecclesias- 
tical channel,  it  does  not  flow  any  where,  and  there  is  none 
at  all  to  run.  Thus  it  is  easy  to  explain  the  complaint  of  the 
Catholics  at  the  great  defection  of  the  most  enlightened 
nations  of  Europe  ;  the  lamentation  of  the  Protestants  at  the 
heresy  of  the  most  enlightened  portion  of  their  sect ;  and  the 
Unitarian  wail  over  the  general  decline  of  piety  in  the  city 
of  Boston.  Some  men  can  only  judge  the  present  age  by 
the  conventional  standard  of  the  past,  and  as  the  old  form 
of  piety  does  not  appear,  they  must  conclude  there  is  no 
piety. 

Let  us  now  recur  to  the  other  or  natural  standard,  and 
look  at  the  manifestation  of  piety  in  the  form  of  morality. 
Last  Sunday  I  spoke  of  our  moral  condition  ;  and  it  appeared 
that  morals  were  in  a  low  state  here  when  compared  with 
the  ideal  morals  of  Christianity.  Now  as  the  outward  deed 
is  but  the  manifestation  of  the  inward  life,  and  objective 
humanity  the  index  of  subjective  divinity,  so  the  low  state 
of  morals  proves  a  low  state  of  piety :  if  the  heart  of  this 
town  was  right  towards  God,  then  would  its  hand  also  be 
right  towards  man.  I  am  one  of  those  who  for  long  years 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  313 

have  lamented  the  want  of  vital  piety  in  this  people.  We 
not  only  do  not  realize  spiritual  things,  but  we  do  not  make 
them  our  ideals.  I  see  proofs  of  this  want  of  piety  in  the 
low  morals  of  trade,  of  the  public  press ;  in  poverty,  intem- 
perance, and  crime  ;  in  the  vices  and  social  wrongs  touched 
on  the  last  Sunday.  I  judge  the  tree  by  its  fruit.  But  it  is 
not  on  this  ground  that  the  ecclesiastical  complaint  is  based. 
Men  who  make  so  much  ado  about  the  absence  of  piety,  do 
not  appeal  for  proof  thereof  to  the  great  vices  and  prominent 
sins  of  the  times ;  they  see  no  sign  of  that  in  our  trade  and 
our  politics ;  in  the  misery  that  festers  in  putrid  lanes,  one 
day  to  breed  a  pestilence,  which  it  were  even  cheaper  to 
hinder  now,  than  cure  at  a  later  time  ;  nobody  mentions  as 
proof  the  Mexican  War,  the  political  dishonesty  of  officers, 
the  rapacity  of  office-seekers,  the  servility  of  men  who  will 
tamely  suffer  the  most  sacred  rights  of  three  millions  of  men 
to  be  trodden  into  the  dust.  Matters  which  concern  millions 
of  men  came  up  before  your  Congress ;  the  great  Senator  of 
Massachusetts  loitered  away  the  time  of  the  session  here  in 
Boston,  managing  a  law  suit  for  a  few  thousand  dollars,  and 
no  fault  was  publicly  found  with  such  neglect  of  public  duty ; 
but  men  see  no  lack  of  piety  indicated  by  this  fact,  and 
others  like  it ;  they  find  signs  of  that  lack  in  empty  pews, 
in  a  deserted  communion-table,  in  the  fact  that  children, 
though  brought  up  to  reverence  truth  and  justice,  to  love 
man  and  to  love  God,  are  not  baptized  with  water;  or  in  the 
fact  that  Unitarianism  or  Triuitarianism  is  on  the  decline ! 
How  many  waitings  have  we  all  heard  or  read,  because  the 
Puritan  churches  of  Boston  have  not  kept  the  faith  of  their 
grim  founders  ;  what  lamentations  at  the  rising  up  of  a  sect 
which  refuses  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  or  at  the  appear- 
ance of  a  few  men  who,  neglecting  the  common  props  of 
Christianity,  rest  it,  for  its  basis,  on  the  nature  of  man  and 
the  nature  of  God :  though  almost  all  the  eminent  philan- 
thropy of  the  day  is  connected  with  these  men,  yet  they  are 
still  called  "  Infidel,"  and  reviled  on  all  hands  ! 
27 


314  SERMON    OF    THE 

The  state  of  things  mentioned  in  the  last  sermon  does 
indicate  a  want  of  piety,  a  deep  and  a  great  want.  I  do 
not  see  signs  of  that  in  the  debt  and  decay  of  churches, 
in  absence  from  meetings,  in  doubt  of  theological  dogmas, 
in  neglect  of  forms  and  ceremonies  which  once  were  of 
great  value  ;  but  I  do  see  it  in  the  low  morals  of  trade,  of 
the  press ;  in  the  popular  vices.  On  a  national  scale  I  see 
it  in  the  depravity  of  political  parties,  in  the  wicked  war 
we  have  just  fought,  in  the  slavery  we  still  tolerate  and 
support.  Yes,  as  I  look  on  the  churches  of  this  city,  I  see 
a  want  of  piety  in  the  midst  of  us.  If  eminent  piety  were 
in  them,  and  allowed  to  follow  its  natural  bent,  it  would 
come  out  of  them  in  the  form  of  eminent  humanity;  they 
would  lead  in  the  philanthropies  of  this  day,  where  they 
hardly  follow.  In  this  condition  of  the  churches  I  see  a 
most  signal  proof  of  the  low  estate  of  piety  ;  they  do  not 
manifest  a  love  of  truth,  which  is  the  piety  of  the  intellect ; 
nor  a  love  of  justice,  which  is  the  piety  of  the  moral  sense ; 
nor  a  love  of  love,  which  is  the  piety  of  the  affections ;  nor 
a  love  of  God  as  the  Infinite  Father  of  all  men,  which  is  the 
total  piety  of  the  whole  soul.  For  lack  of  this  internal 
divinity  there  is  a  lack  of  external  humanity.  Who  can 
bring  a  clean  thing  out  of  an  unclean  ?  This  is  what  I 
complain  of,  what  I  mourn  over. 

The  clergymen  of  this  city  are  most  of  them  sincere 
men,  I  doubt  not ;  some  of  them  men  of  a  superior  culture ; 
many  of  them  laborious  men ;  most,  perhaps  all  of  them, 
deeply  interested  in  the  welfare  of  the  churches,  and  the 
promotion  of  piety.  But  how  many  of  them  are  marked 
and  known  for  their  philanthropy,  distinguished  for  their 
zeal  in  putting  down  any  of  the  major  sins  of  our  day, 
zealous  in  any  work  of  reform  ?  I  fear  I  can  count  them 
all  on  the  fingers  of  a  single  hand  ;  yet  there  are  enough  to 
bewail  the  departure  of  monastic  forms,  and  of  the  theology 
which  led  men  in  the  dimness  of  a  darker  age,  but  cannot 
shine  in  the  rising  light  of  this.  I  find  no  fault  with  these 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  315 

men  ;  I  blame  them  not ;  it  is  their  profession  which  so 
blinds  their  eyes.  They  are  as  wise  and  as  valiant  as  the 
churches  let  them  be.  What  sect  in  all  this  land  ever  cared 
about  temperance,  education,  peace  betwixt  nations,  or  even 
the  freedom  of  all  men  in  our  own,  so  much  as  this  sect 
cares  for  the  baptizing  of  children  with  water,  and  that  for 
the  baptizing  of  men  ;  this  for  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity, 
and  all  for  the  infallibility  of  the  Bible  ?  Do  you  ask  the 
sects  to  engage  in  the  work  of  extirpating  concrete  wrong  ? 
It  is  in  vain;  each  reformer  tries  it  —  the  mild  sects 
answer,  "  I  pray  thee  have  me  excused  ; "  the  sterner  sects 
reply  with  awful  speech.  A  distinguished  theological  jour- 
nal of  another  city  thinks  the  philanthropies  of  this  day  are 
hostile  to  piety,  and  declares  that  true  spiritual  Christianity 
never  prevails  where  men  think  slavery  is  a  sin.  A  dis- 
tinguished minister  of  a  highly  respectable  sect  declares 
the  temperance  societies  unchristian,  and  even  atheistical. 
He  reasons  thus  :  The  church  is  an  instrument  appointed  by 
God  and  Christ,  to  overcome  all  forms  of  wrong,  intemper- 
ance among  the  rest ;  to  neglect  this  instrument  and  devise 
another,  a  temperance  society,  to  wit,  is  to  abandon  the 
institutions  of  God  and  Christ,  and  so  it  is  unchristian  and 
atheistical.  In  other  words,  here  is  intemperance,  a  stone 
of  stumbling  and  a  rock  of  offence,  in  our  way;  there  is 
an  old  wooden  beetle,  which  has  done  great  service  of  old 
time,  and  is  said  to  have  been  made  by  God's  own  hand ; 
men  smite  therewith  the  stone  or  smite  it  not ;  still  it  lies 
there  a  stone  of  stumbling  and  a  stone  of  shame;  other 
men  approach,  and  with  a  sledge-hammer  of  well-tempered 
steel  smite  the  rock,  and  break  off  piece  after  piece,  smooth- 
ing the  rough  impracticable  way  ;  they  call  on  men  to  come 
to  their  aid,  with  such  weapons  as  they  will.  But  our  min- 
ister bids  them  beware ;  the  beetle  is  "  of  the  Lord,"  the 
iron  which  breaks  the  rock  in  pieces  is  an  unchristian  and 
atheistical  instrument.  Yet  was  this  minister  an  earnest,  a 
pious,  and  a  self-denying  man,  who  sincerely  sought  the 


316  SERMON    OF    THE 

good  of  men.  He  had  been  taught  to  know  no  piety  but 
in  the  church's  form.  I  would  not  do  dishonor  to  the 
churches  ;  they  have  done  great  service,  they  still  do  much  ; 
I  would  only  ask  them  to  be  worthy  of  their  Christian  name. 
They  educate  men  a  little,  and  allow  them  to  approach 
emancipation,  but  never  to  be  free  and  go  alone. 

I  see  much  to  complain  of  in  the  condition  of  piety  ;  yet 
nothing  to  be  alarmed  at.  When  I  look  back,  it  seems 
worse  still,  far  worse.  There  has  not  been  "A  decline  of 
piety  "  in  Boston  of  late  years.  Religion  is  not  sick.  Last 
Sunday,  I  spoke  of  the  great  progress  made  in  morality 
within  fifty  years  ;  I  said  it  was  an  immense  progress  within 
two  hundred  years.  Now,  there  cannot  be  such  a  progress 
in  the  outward  manifestation  without  a  corresponding  and 
previous  development  of  the  inward  principle.  Morality 
cannot  grow  without  piety  more  than  an  oak  without  water, 
earth,  and  sun,  and  air.  Let  me  go  back  one  hundred 
years  ;  see  what  a  difference  between  the  religious  aspect 
of  things  then  and  now !  certainly  there  has  been  a  great 
growth  in  spirituality  since  that  day.  I  am  not  to  judge 
mens'  hearts  ;  I  may  take  their  outward  lives  as  the  test  and 
measure  of  their  inward  piety.  Will  you  say  the  outward 
life  never  completely  comes  up  to  that  ?  It  does  so  as  com- 
pletely now  as  then.  Compare  the  toleration  of  these  times 
with  those  ;  compare  the  intelligence  of  the  community  ; 
the  temperance,  sobriety,  chastity,  virtue  in  general.  Look 
at  what  is  now  done  in  a  municipal  way  by  towns  and 
States  for  mankind  ;  see  the  better  provision  made  for  the 
poor,  for  the  deaf,  the  dumb,  the  blind,  for  the  insane,  even 
for  the  idiot ;  see  what  is  done  for  the  education  of  the 
people  —  in  schools,  academies,  colleges,  and  by  public 
lectures ;  what  is  done  for  the  criminal  to  prevent  the 
growth  of  crime.  See  what  an  amelioration  of  the  penal 
laws ;  how  men  are  saved  and  restored  to  society,  who  had 
once  been  wholly  lost.  See  what  is  done  by  philanthropy 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OP    BOSTON.  317 

still  more  eminent,  which  the  town  and  State  have  not  yet 
overtaken  and  enacted  into  law  ;  by  the  various  societies  for 
reform  — those  for  temperance,  for  peace,  for  the  discipline 
of  prisons,  for  the  discharged  convicts,  for  freeing  the  slave. 
See  this  Anti-slavery  party,  which,  in  twenty  years,  has 
become  so  powerful  throughout  all  the  Northern  States,  so 
strong  that  it  cannot  be  howled  down,  and  men  begin  to  find 
it  hardly  safe  to  howl  over  it ;  a  party  which  only  waits  the 
time  to  lift  up  its  million  arms,  and  hurl  the  hateful  institu- 
tion of  slavery  out  of  the  land  !  All  these  humane  move- 
ments come  from  a  divine  piety  in  the  soul  of  man.  A  tree 
which  bears  such  fruits  is  not  a  dead  tree ;  is  not  wholly  to 
be  despaired  of;  is  not  yet  in  a  "  decline,"  and  past  all 
hope  of  recovery.  Is  the  age  wanting  in  piety,  which  makes 
such  efforts  as  these  ?  Yes,  you  will  say,  because  it  does 
no  more.  I  agree  to  this,  but  it  is  rich  in  piety  compared  to 
other  times.  Ours  is  an  age  of  faith  ;  not  of  mere  belief  in 
the  commandments  of  men,  but  of  faith  in  the  nature  of 
man  and  the  commandments  of  God. 

This  prevailing  and  contagious  complaint  about  the  decline 
of  religion  is  not  one  of  the  new  things  of  our  time.  In  the 
beginning  of  the  last  century,  Dr.  Colman,  first  minister  of 
the  church  in  Brattle-street,  lamented  in  small  capitals  over 
the  general  decline  of  piety  :  —  "  The  venerable  name  of 
religion  and  of  the  church  is  made  a  sham  pretence  for  the 
worst  of  villanies,  for  uncharitableness  and  unnatural  op- 
pression of  the  pious  and  the  peaceable  ;"  "  the  perilous 
times  are  come,  wherein  men  are  lovers  only  of  their  own 
selves."  "  Ah,  calamitous  day,"  says  he,  "  into  which  we 
are  fallen,  and  into  which  the  sins  of  our  infatuated  age 
have  brought  us  !  "  He  looks  back  to  the  founders  of  New 
England  ;  they  "were  rich  in  faith,  and  heirs  of  a  better 
world,"  "  men  of  whom  the  world  was  not  worthy  ;"  "  they 
laid  in  a  stock  of  prayers  for  us  which  have  brought  down 
many  blessings  on  us  already."  Samuel  Willard  bewailed 
"the  checkered  state  of  the  gospel  church;"  it  was 


318  SERMON    OF    THE 

"  in  every  respect  a  gloomy  day,  and  covered  with  thick 
clouds." 

We  retire  yet  further  back,  to  the  end  of  the  seventeenth 
century;  a  hundred  and  sixty  or  seventy  years  ago,  Dr. 
Increase  Mather,  not  only  in  his  own  pulpit,  but  also  at  "  the 
great  and  Thursday  lecture,"  lamented  over  "  the  degen- 
eracy and  departing  glory  of  New  England."  He  com- 
plained that  there  was  a  neglect  of  the  Sabbath,  of  the 
ordinances,  and  of  family  worship  ;  he  groaned  at  the  lax 
discipline  of  the  churches,  and  looked,  says  another,  "  as 
fearfully  on  the  growing  charity  as  on  the  growing  vices  of 
the  age."  He  called  the  existing  generation  "  an  uncon- 
verted generation."  "Atheism  and  profaneness,"  says  he, 
"  have  come  to  a  prodigious  height ;"  "  God  will  visit  "  for 
these  things ;  "  God  is  about  to  open  the  windows  of 
heaven,  and  pour  down  the  cataracts  of  His  wrath  ere 
this  generation  ;  is  passed  away."  If  a  comet 

appeared  in  the  sky,  it  was  to  admonish  men  of  the  visita- 
tion, and  make  "  the  haughty  daughters  of  Zion  reform 
their  pride  of  apparel."  "  The  world  is  full  of  unbelief," 
(that  is,  in  the  malignant  aspect  and  disastrous  influence  of 
comets,)  "  but  there  is  an  awful  Scripture  for  them  that  do 
prophanely  condemn  such  signal  works  !  " 

One  of  the  present  and  well  known  indications  of  the 
decline  of  piety,  that  is  often  thought  a  modern  luxury,  and 
ridiculously  denounced  in  the  pulpit,  which  has  done  its 
part  in  fostering  the  enjoyment,  was  practised  to  an  extent 
that  alarmed  the  prim  shepherds  of  the  New  England  flock 
in  earlier  days.  The  same  Dr.  Mather  preached  a  series  of 
sermons  "  tending  to  promote  the  power  of  godliness,"  and 
concludes  the  whole  with  a  discourse  "  Of  sleeping  at  ser- 
mons," and  says ;  "  To  sleep  in  the  public  worship  of  God 
is  a  thing  too  frequently  and  easily  practised  ;  it  is  a  great 
and  a  dangerous  evil."  "  Sleeping  at  a  sermon  is  a  greater 
sin  than  speaking  an  idle  word.  Therefore,  if  men  must 
be  called  to  account  for  idle  words,  much  more  for  this !  " 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  319 

"  Gospel  sermons  are  among  the  most  precious  talents 
which  any  in  this  world  have  conferred  upon  them.  But 
what  a  sad  account  will  be  given  concerning  those  sermons 
which  have  been  slept  away  !  As  light  as  thou  makest  of 
it  now,  it  may  be  conscience  will  roar  for  it  upon  a  death- 
bed !  "  "  Verily,  there  is  many  a  soul  that  will  find  this  to 
be  a  dismal  thought  at  the  day  of  judgment,  when  he  shall 
remember  so  many  sermons  I  might  have  heard  for  my 
everlasting  benefit,  but  I  slighted  and  slept  them  all  away. 
Therefore  consider,  if  men  allow  themselves  in  this  evil 
their  souls  are  in  danger  to  perish."  "  It  is  true  that  a 
godly  man  may  be  subject  unto  this  as  well  as  unto  other 
infirmities  ;  but  he  doth  not  allow  himself  therein."  "  The 
name  of  the  glorious  God  is  greatly  prophaned  by  this 
inadvertency."  "  The  support  of  the  evangelical  ministry 
is  .  .  discouraged."  He  thought  the  character  of  the 
pulpit  was  not  sufficient  explanation  of  this  phenomenon, 
and  adds,  in  his  supernatural  way,  "  Satan  is  the  external 
cause  of  this  evil ; "  "  he  had  rather  have  men  wakeful  at 
any  time  than  at  sermon  time."  The  good  man  mentions, 
by  way  of  example,  a  man  who  "  had  not  slept  a  wink  at  a 
sermon  for  more  than  twenty  years  together,"  and  also,  but 
by  way  of  warning,  the  unlucky  youth  in  the  Acts  who 
slept  at  Paul's  long  sermon,  and  fell  out  of  the  window,  and 
"  was  taken  up  dead."  Sleeping  was  "  adding  something 
of  our  own  to  the  worship  of  God ; "  "  when  Nadab  and 
Abihu  did  so,  there  went  out  fire  from  the  Lord  and  con- 
sumed them  to  death."  "  The  holy  God  hath  not  been  a 
little  displeased  for  this  sin."  "  It  is  not  punished  by  men, 
but  therefore  the  Lord  himself  will  visit  for  it."  "Tears 
of  blood  will  trickle  down  thy  dry  and  damned  cheeks  for 
ever  and  ever,  because  thou  mayest  not  be  so  happy  as  to 
hear  one  sermon,  or  to  have  one  offer  of  grace  more 
throughout  the  never-ending  dayes  of  eternity."  Other  men 
denounced  their  "  Wo  to  sleepy  sinners,"  and  issued  their 
"  Proposals  for  the  revival  of  dying  religion." 


320  SERMON    OF    THE 

Dr.  Mather  thought  there  was  "  A  deluge  of  prophane- 
ness,"  and  bid  men  "  be  much  in  mourning  and  humiliation 
that  God's  bottle  may  be  filled  with  tears."  He  thought  piety 
was  going  out  because  surplices  were  coming  in  ;  it  was 
wicked  to  "  consecrate  a  church  ;  "  keeping  Christmas  was 
"  like  the  idolatry  of  the  calf."  The  common-prayer,  an 
organ,  a  musical  instrument  in  a  church,  was  "  not  of  God." 
Such  things  were  to  our  worthy  fathers  in  the  ministry  what 
temperance  and  anti-slavery  societies  are  to  many  of  their 
sons  —  an  "  abomination,"  "  unchristian  and  atheistic  ! " 
The  introduction  of  "regular  singing"  was  an  indication  to 
some  that  "  all  religion  is  to  cease ; "  "  we  might  as  well  go 
over  to  Popery  at  once."  Inoculation  for  the  small-pox  was 
as  vehemently  and  ably  opposed  as  the  modern  attempt  to 
abolish  the  gallows ;  it  was  "  a  trusting  more  to  the  ma- 
chinations of  men  than  to  the  all-wise  providence  of  God." 

"  When  the  enchantments  of  this  world,"  says  the  eccle- 
siastical historian,  "  caused  the  rising  generation  more  sen- 
sibly to  neglect  the  primitive  designs  and  interests  of  religion 
propounded  by  their  fathers  ;  a  change  in  the  tenor  of  the 
divine  dispensation  towards  this  country  was  quickly  the 
matter  of  every  one's  observation."  "  Our  wheat  and  our 
pease  fell  under  an  unaccountable  blast."  "  We  were 
visited  with  multiplied  shipwrecks ; "  "  pestilential  sick- 
nesses did  sometimes  become  epidemic  among  us."  "  In- 
dians cruelly  butchered  many  hundreds  of  our  inhabitants, 
and  scattered  whole  towns  with  miserable  ruins."  "  The 
serious  people  throughout  the  land  were  awakened  by  these 
intimations  of  divine  displeasure  to  inquire  into  the  causes 
and  matters  of  the  controversie."  Accordingly,  1679,  a 
synod  was  convened  at  Boston,  to  "  inquire  into  the  causes 
of  the  Lord's  controversie  with  his  New  England  people," 
who  determined  the  matter.* 


*  The  Synod  declared:   "That  God  hath  a  controversie  with  his 
New  England  people  is  undeniable."     "  There  are  visible  manifest 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  321 

A  little  later,  in  1690,  the  General  Court  considered  the 
subject  anew,  and  declared,  that  "  A  corruption  of  manners, 

evils,  which  without  doubt  the  Lord  is  provoked  by."  1.  "  A  great 
and  visible  decay  of  the  power  of  Godliness  amongst  many  professors 
in  these  churches."  2.  "  Pride  doth  abound  in  New  England- 
Many  have  offended  God  by  strange  apparel."  3.  "  Church  fellow- 
ship and  other  divine  institutions  are  grossly  neglected."  "  Quakers 
are  false  worshippers,"  "and  Anabaptists  ...  do  no  better 
than  set  up  an  Altar  against  the  Lord's  Altar."  4.  "  The  holy  and 
glorious  name  of  God  hath  been  polluted;  "  "because  of  swearing 
the  land  mourns."  "  It  is  a  frequent  thing  for  men  to  sit  in  prayer- 
time  .  .  .  and  to  give  way  to  their  own  sloth  and  sleepiness.'' 
"  We  read  of  but  one  man  in  Scripture  that  slept  at  a  sermon,  and 
that  sin  had  like  to  have  cost  him  his  life."  5.  "  There  is  much 
Sabbath-breaking ;  since  there  are  multitudes  that  do  profanely 
absent  themselves  from  the  publick  worship  of  God,  .  .  .  walk- 
ing abroad  and  travelling  .  .  .  being  a  common  practice  on  the 
Sabbath  Day."  "  Worldly  unsuitable  discourses  are  very  common 
upon  the  Lord's  Day."  "  This  brings  wrath,  fires,  and  other  judg- 
ments upon  a  professing  people."  6.  "  As  to  what  concerns  families 
and  Government  thereof,  there  is  much  amiss."  "  Children  and 
servants  .  .  .  are  not  kept  in  due  subjection.'1  "This  is  a  sin 
which  brings  great  judgments,  as  we  see  in  Eli's  and  David's  fam- 
ily." 7.  "  Inordinate  passions,  sinful  heats  and  hatreds,  and  that 
amongst  church  members."  8.  "  There  is  much  intemperance : " 
"  it  is  a  common  practice  for  town-dwellers,  yea,  and  church-members, 
to  frequent  public  houses,  and  there  to  misspend  precious  time."  9. 
"  There  is  much  want  of  truth  amongst  men.1'  "  The  Lord  is  not 
wont  to  suffer  such  iniquity  to  pass  unpunished."  10.  "  Inordinate 
affection  unto  the  world."  "  There  hath  been  in  many  professors  an 
insatiable  desire  after  land  and  worldly  accommodations  ;  yea,  so  as 
to  forsake  churches  and  ordinances,  and  to  live  like  heathen,  only  so 
that  they  might  have  elbow-room  in  the  world.  Farms  and  merchan- 
disings  have  been  preferred  before  the  things  of  God."  "  Such 
iniquity  causeth  war  to  be  in  the  gate,  and  cities  to  be  burned  up." 
"  When  Lot  did  forsake  the  land  of  Canaan  and  the  church  which  was 
in  Abraham's  family,  that  so  he  might  have  better  worldly  accom- 
modations in  Sodom,  God  fired  him  out  of  all."  "  There  are  some 
traders  that  sell  their  goods  at  excessive  rates ;  day-laborers  and 
mechanicks  are  unreasonable  in  their  demands."  11.  "  There  hath 
been  opposition  to  the  work  of  reformation."  12.  "  A  publick  spirit 


322  SERMON    OF    THE 

attended  with  inexcusable  degeneracies  and  apostacies  . 
is  the  cause  of  the  controversie."  We  "  are  now  arriving 
at  such  an  extremity,  that  the  axe  is  laid  to  the  root  of  the 
trees,  and  we  are  in  eminent  danger  of  perishing,  if  a  speedy 
reformation  of  our  provoking  evils  prevent  it  not."  In  1702, 
Cotton  Mather  complains  that  "  Our  manifold  indispositions 
to  recover  the  dying  power  of  Godliness,  were  successive 
calamities,  under  all  of  which,  our  apostacies  from  that  God- 
liness, have  rather  proceeded  than  abated."  "  The  old 
spirit  of  New  England  has  been  sensibly  going  out  of  the 
world,  as  the  old  saints  in  whom  it  was  have  gone  ;  and, 
instead  thereof,  the  spirit  of  the  world,  with  a  lamentable 
neglect  of  strict  piety,  has  crept  in  upon  the  rising  genera- 
tion." 

You  go  back  to  the  time  of  the  founders  and  fathers  of 
the  colony,  and  it  is  no  better.  In  1667,  Mr.  Wilson,  who 
had  "  A  singular  gift  in  the  practice  of  discipline,"  on  his 
death-bed  declared,  that  "  God  would  judge  the  people  for 
their  rebellion  and  self-willed  spirit,  for  their  contempt  of 
civil  and  ecclesiastical  rulers,  and  for  their  luxury  and 
sloth,"  and  before  that  he  said,  "  People  rise  up  as  Corah, 
against  their  ministers."  "  And  for  our  neglect  of  baptizing 
the  children  of  the  church,  .  .  I  think  God  is  provoked 
by  it.  Another  sin  I  take  to  be  the  making  light  . 
of  the  authority  of  the  Synods."  John  Norton,  whose  piety 
was  said  to  be  "  Grace,  grafted  on  a  crab-stock,"  in  1660, 
growled,  after  his  wont,  on  account  of  the  "  Heart  of  New 
England,  rent  with  the  blasphemies  of  this  generation." 
John  Cotton,  the  ablest  man  in  New  England,  who  "  Liked 
to  sweeten  his  mouth  with  a  piece  of  Calvin,  before  he  went 
to  sleep,"  and  was  so  pious  that  another  could  not  swear 
while  he  was  under  the  roof,  mourned  at  "The  condition  of 

is  greatly  wanting  in  the  most  of  men."  13.  "  There  are  sins 
against  the  gospel,  whereby  the  Lord  has  been  provoked."  "  Christ 
is  not  prized  and  embraced  in  all  his  offices  and  ordinances  as  ought 
to  be." 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  323 

the  churches  ;  "  and,  in  1652,  on  his  death-bed,  after  bestow- 
ing  his  blessing  on  the  President  of  Harvard  College,  who 
had  begged  it  of  him,  exhorted  the  elders  to  "  Increase  their 
watch  against  those  declensions,  which  he  saw  the  profes- 
sors of  religion  falling  into."  *  In  1641,  such  was  the  con- 
dition of  piety  in  Boston,  that  it  was  thought  necessary  to 
banish  a  man,  because  he  did  not  believe  in  original  sin.  In 
1639,  a  fast  was  appointed,  "To  deplore  the  prevalence  of 
the  small-pox,  the  want  of  zeal  in  the  professors  of  religion, 
and  the  general  decay  of  piety."  "  The  church  of  God 
had  not  long  been  in  this  wilderness,"  thus  complains  a 
minister,  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago,  "  before  the 
dragon  cast  forth  several  floods  to  devour  it ;  but  not  the 
least  of  these  floods  was  one  of  the  Antinomian  and  familis- 
tical  heresies."  "It  is  incredible  what  alienations  of  mind, 
and  what  a  very  calenture  the  devil  raised  in  the  country 
upon  this  odd  occasion."  "  The  sectaries "  "  began  usu- 
ally to  seduce  women  into  their  notions,  and  by  these 
women,  like  their  first  mother,  they  soon  hooked  in  the  hus- 
bands also."  So,  in  1637,  the  Synod  of  Cambridge  was 
convened,  to  dispatch  "  The  apostate  serpent :  "  one  woman 

*  In  1646,  Mr.  Samuel  Syraonds  wrote  to  Governor  Winthrop,  as 
follows  :  "  1  will  also  mention  the  text  preached  upon  at  our  last  fast, 
and  the  propositions  raised  thereupon,  because  it  was  so  seasonable 
to  New  England's  condition.  Jeremiah  xxx.  17.  For  I  will  restore 
health  to  thee,  and  heal  thee  of  thy  wounds,  saith  the  Lord  ;  because 
they  called  thee  an  outcast,  saying,  This  is  Zion,  whom  noe  man 
careth  for. 

"  1.  Prop.    That  sick  tymes  doe  passe  over  Ziorj. 

"  2.  That  sad  and  bitter  neglect  is  the  portion,  aggravation  and 
affliction  of  Zion  in  the  tyme  of  his  sicknesse  and  wounds,  but  espe- 
cially in  the  neglect  of  those  that  doe  neglect  it,  and  yet,  notwith- 
standing, doe  acknowledge  it  to  be  Zion. 

"  3.  That  the  season  of  penitent  Zion's  passion,  is  the  season  of 
God's  compassion." 

"  This  sermon  tended  much  to  the  settling  of  Godly  minds  here  in 
God's  way,  and  to  raise  their  spirits,  and,  as  I  conceive,  hath  suita- 
ble effects." 


324  SERMON    OF    THK 

was  duly  convicted  of  holding  "  About  thirty  monstrous 
opinions,"  and  subsequently,  by  the  civil  authorities,  ban- 
ished from  the  colony.  The  synod,  after  much  time  was 
"  spent  in  ventilation  and  emptying  of  private  passions," 
condemned  eighty-two  opinions,  then  prevalent  in  the  colony, 
as  erroneous,  and  decided  to  "  Refer  doubts  to  be  resolved 
by  the  great  God."  Even  in  1636,  John  Wilson  lamented 
"  The  dark  and  distracted  condition  of  the  churches  of  New 
England." 

"  The  good  old  times,"  when  piety  was  in  a  thriving 
state,  and  the  churches  successful  and  contented,  lay  as  far 
behind  the  "  Famous  Johns,"  as  it  now  does  behind  their 
successors  in  office  and  lamentation.  Then,  as  now,  the 
complaint  had  the  same  foundation  :  ministers  and  other 
good  men  could  not  see  that  new  piety  will  not  be  put  into 
the  old  forms,  neither  .the  old  forms  of  thought,  nor  the  old 
forms  of  action.  In  the  days  of  Wilson,  Cotton,  and  Nor- 
ton, there  was  a  gradual  growth  of  piety  ;  in  the  days  of  the 
Mathers,  of  Colman,  and  Willard,  and  from  that  time  to  this, 
there  has  been  a  steady  improvement  of  the  community,  in 
intellectual,  moral,  and  religious  culture.  Some  men  could 
not  see  the  progress  two  hundred  years  ago,  because  they 
believed  in  no  piety,  except  as  it  was  manifested  in  their 
conventional  forms.  It  is  so  now.  Mankind  advances  by 
the  irresistible  law  of  God,  under  the  guidance  of  a  few 
men  of  large  discourse,  who  look  before  and  after,  but  amid 
the  wailing  of  many  who  think  each  advance  is  a  retreat, 
and  every  stride  a  stumble. 

Now-a-days  nobody  complains  at  "  The  ungodly  custom 
of  wearing  long  hair ;  "  no  dandy  is  dealt  with  by  the  church, 
for  his  dress  ;  the  weakest  brother  is  not  offended  by  "  Regu- 
lar singing,"  —  so  it  be  regular,  —  "  by  organs  and  the  like  ;  " 
nobody  laments  at  "  The  reading  of  Scripture  lessons,"  or 
"  The  use  of  the  Lord's  Prayer  "  in  public  religious  servi- 
ces, or  is  offended,  because  a  clergyman  makes  a  prayer  at 
a  funeral,  and  solemnizes  a  marriage,  —  though  these  are 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  325 

"  prelatical  customs,"  and  were  detested  by  our  fathers. 
Yet,  other  things,  now  as  much  dreaded,  and  thought  "  of  a 
bad  and  dangerous  tendency,"  will  one  day  prove  them- 
selves as  innocent,  though  now  as  much  mourned  over. 
Many  an  old  doctrine  will  fade  out,  and  though  some  think 
a  star  has  fallen  out  of  heaven,  a  new  truth  will  rise  up  and 
take  its  place.  It  is  to  be  expected  that  ministers  will  often 
complain  of  "  The  general  decay  of  religion."  The  posi- 
tion of  a  clergyman,  fortunate  in  many  things,  is  unhappy 
in  this :  he  seldom  sees  the  result  of  his  labors,  except  in 
the  conventional  form  mentioned  above.  The  lawyer,  the 
doctor,  the  merchant,  and  mechanic,  the  statesman  and  the 
fanner,  all  have  visible  and  palpable  results  of  their  work, 
while  the  minister  can  only  see  that  he  has  baptized  men, 
and  admitted  them  to  his  church ;  the  visible  and  quotable 
tokens  of  his  success,  are  a  large  audience,  respectable  and 
attentive,  a  thriving  Sunday  school,  or  a  considerable  body 
of  communicants.  If  these  signs  fail,  or  become  less  than 
formerly,  he  thinks  he  has  labored  in  vain  ;  that  piety  is  on 
the  decline,  for  it  is  only  by  this  form  that  he  commonly 
tests  and  measures  piety  itself.  Hence,  a  sincere  and  ear- 
nest minister,  with  the  limitations  which  he  so  easily  gets 
from  his  profession  and  social  position,  is  always  prone  to 
think  ill  of  the  times,  to  undervalue  the  new  wine  which 
refuses  to  be  kept  in  the  old  bottles,  but  rends  them  asunder  ; 
hence  he  bewails  the  decline  of  religion,  and  looks  longingly 
back  to  the  days  of  his  fathers. 

But  you  will  ask,  Why  does  not  a  minister  demand  piety 
in  its  natural  form  ?  Blame  him  not ;  unconsciously  he 
fulfils  his  contract,  and  does  what  he  is  taught,  ordained,  and 
paid  for  doing.  It  is  safe  for  a  minister  to  demand  piety  of 
his  parish,  in  the  conventional  form  ;  not  safe  to  demand  it 
in  the  form  of  morality  —  eminent  piety,  in  the  form  of 
philanthropy  :  it  would  be  an  innovation ;  it  would  "  Hurt 
men's  feelings  ; "  it  might  disturb  some  branches  of  busi- 
ness ;  at  the  North,  it  would  interfere  with  the  liquor-trade  ; 
28 


326  SERMON    OF    THE 

at  the  south,  with  the  slave-trade  ;  every  where  it  would  de- 
mand what  many  men  do  not  like  to  give.  If  a  man  asks 
piety  in  the  form  of  bodily  attendance  at  church,  on  the 
only  idle  day  in  the  week,  when  business  and  amusement 
must  be  refrained  from  ;  in  the  form  of  belief  in  doctrines 
which  are  commonly  accepted  by  the  denomination,  and 
compliance  with  its  forms,  —  that  is  customary  ;  it  hurts 
nobody's  feelings  ;  it  does  not  disturb  the  liquor-trade,  nor 
the  slave-trade ;  it  interferes  with  nothing,  not  even  with 
respectable  sleep  in  a  comfortable  pew.  A  minister,  like 
others,  loves  to  be  surrounded  by  able  and  respectable  men  ; 
he  seeks,  therefore,  a  congregation  of  such.  If  he  is  him- 
self an  able  man,  it  is  well  ;  but  there  are  few  in  any  call- 
ing, whom  we  designate  as  able.  Our  weak  man  cannot 
instruct  his  parishioners;  he  soon  learns  this,  and  ceases  to 
give  them  counsel  on  matters  of  importance.  They  would 
not  suffer  it,  for  the  larger  includes  the  less,  not  the  less  the 
larger.  He  is  not  strong  by  nature  ;  their  position  over- 
looks and  commands  his.  He  must  speak  and  give  some 
counsel ;  he  wisely  limits  himself  to  things  of  but  little  prac- 
tical interest,  and  his  parishioners  are  not  offended  :  "  That 
is  my  sentiment  exactly,"  says  the  most  worldly  man  in  the 
church,  "  Religion  is  too  pure  to  be  mixed  up  with  the  prac- 
tical business  of  the  street."  The  original  and  effectual 
preaching,  in  such  cases,  is  not  from  the  pulpit  down  upon 
the  pews,  but  from  the  pews  up  to  the  pulpit,  which  only 
echoes,  consciously  or  otherwise,  but  does  not  speak. 

In  a  solar  system,  the  central  sun,  not  barely  powerful 
from  its  position,  is  the  most  weighty  body ;  heavier  than 
all  the  rest  put  together  ;  so  with  even  swing  they  all  revolve 
about  it.  Our  little  ministerial  sun  was  ambitious  of  being 
amongst  large  satellites ;  he  is  there,  but  the  law  of  gravita- 
tion amongst  men  is  as  certain  as  in  matter;  he  cannot 
poise  and  swing  the  system  ;  he  is  not  the  sun  thereof,  not 
even  a  primary  planet,  only  a  little  satellite  revolving  with 
many  nutations  round  some  primary,  in  an  orbit  that  is 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  327 

oblique,  complicated,  and  difficult  to  calculate  ;  now  waxing 
in  a  "  Revival,"  now  waning  in  a  "  Decline  of  piety," 
now  totally  eclipsed  by  his  primary  that  comes  between  him 
and  the  light  which  lighteth  every  man.  Put  one  of  the 
cold  thin  moons  of  Saturn  into  the  centre  of  the  solar  sys- 
tem,—  would  the  universe  revolve  about  that  little  dot? 
Loyal  matter  with  irresistible  fealty  gravitates  towards  the 
sun,  and  wheels  around  the  balance-point  of  the  world's 
weight,  be  it  where  it  may,  called  by  whatever  name. 

While  ministers  insist  unduly  on  the  conventional  mani- 
festation of  piety,  it  is  not  a  thing  unheard  of  for  a  layman 
to  resolve  to  go  to  heaven  by  the  ecclesiastical  road,  yet 
omit  resolving  to  be  a  good  man  before  he  gets  there. 
Such  a  man  finds  the  ordinary  forms  of  piety  very  conve- 
nient, and  not  at  all  burthensome  ;  they  do  not  interfere 
with  his  daily  practice  of  injustice  and  meanness  of  soul ; 
they  seem  a  substitute  for  real  and  manly  goodness ;  they 
offer  a  royal  road  to  saintship  here  and  heaven  hereafter. 
Is  the  man  in  arrears  with  virtue,  having  long  practised 
wickedness  and  become  insolvent  ?  This  form  is  a  new 
bankrupt  law  of  the  spirit,  he  pays  off  his  old  debts  in  the 
ecclesiastical  currency  —  a  pennyworth  of  form  for  a  pound 
of  substantial  goodness.  This  bankrupt  sinner,  cleared  by 
the  ecclesiastical  chancery,  is  a  solvent  saint ;  he  exhorts 
at  meetings,  strains  at  every  gnat,  and  mourns  over  "  The 
general  decay  of  piety,"  and  teaches  other  men  the  way 
in  which  they  should  go  —  to  the  same  end. 

"  So  morning  insects  that  in  muck  begun, 
Shine,  buz,  and  fly-blow  in  the  evening  sun." 

I  honor  the  founders  of  New  England ;  they  were  pious 
men  —  their  lives  proved  it;  but  domineered  over  by  false 
opinions  in  theology,  they  put  their  piety  into  very  unnat- 
ural and  perverted  forms.  They  had  ideas  which  tran- 
scended their  age  ;  they  came  here  to  make  those  ideas  into 
institutions.  That  they  had  great  faults,  bigotry,  intoler- 


SERMON    OF    THE 

ance  and  superstition,  is  now  generally  conceded.  They 
were  picked  men,  "  wheat  sifted  out  of  three  kingdoms,"  to 
plant  a  new  world  withal.  They  have  left  their  mark  very 
deep  and  very  distinct  in  this  town,  which  was  their  prayer 
and  their  pride.  It  may  seem  unjust  to  ourselves  to  com- 
pare a  whole  community  like  our  own  with  such  a  company 
as  filled  Boston  in  the  first  half  century  of  its  existence,  — 
men  selected  for  their  spiritual  hardihood  ;  but  here  and 
now,  in  the  midst  of  Boston,  are  men  quite  as  eminent  for 
piety,  who  as  far  transcend  this  age,  as  the  Puritans  and  the 
pilgrims  surpassed  their  time.  The  Puritan  put  his  religion 
into  the  ecclesiastical  form  ;  not  into  the  form  of  the  Roman 
or  the  English  Church,  but  into  a  new  one  of  his  own.  His 
descendant,  inheriting  his  father's  faith  in  God,  and  stern 
self-denial,  but  sometimes  without  his  bigotry,  intolerance 
and  superstition,  with  little  fear  but  with  more  love  of  God, 
and  consequently  with  more  lov«  of  man,  puts  his  piety  into 
a  new  form.  It  is  not  the  form  of  the  old  Church  ;  the 
Church  of  the  Puritans  is  to  him  often  what  the  Church  of 
the  Pope  and  the  prelates  was  to  his  ungentle  sire.  He 
puts  his  piety  into  the  form  of  goodness ;  eminent  piety 
becomes  philanthropy,  and  takes  the  shape  of  reform.  In 
such  men,  in  many  of  their  followers,  I  see  the  same  trust. 
in  God,  the  same  scorn  of  compromising  right  and  truth, 
the  same  unfaltering  allegiance  to  the  eternal  Father,  which 
shone  in  the  pilgrims  who  founded  this  new  world,  which 
fired  the  reformers  of  the  Church ;  yes,  which  burned  in 
the  hearts  of  Paul  and  John.  Piety  has  not  failed  and  gone 
out ;  each  age  has  its  own  forms  thereof;  the  old  and  pass- 
ing can  never  understand  the  new,  nor  can  they  consent  to 
decrease  with  the  increase  of  the  new.  Once,  men  put 
their  piety  into  a  church,  Catholic  or  Protestant ;  they  made 
creeds  and  believed  them ;  they  devised  rites  and  symbols, 
which  helped  their  faith.  It  was  well ;  but  we  cannot 
believe  those  creeds,  nor  be  aided  by  such  symbols  and 
such  rites.  Why  pretend  to  drag  a  weighty  crutch  about 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  329 

because  it  helped  your  father  once,  wandering  alone  and  in 
the  dark,  sounding  on  his  dim  and  perilous  way  ?  Once 
earthen  roads  were  the  best  we  knew,  and  horses'  feet  had 
shoes  of  swiftness ;  now  we  need  not,  out  of  reverence, 
refuse  the  iron  road,  the  chariot  and  the  steed  of  flame; 
nor  out  of  irreverence  need  we  spurn  the  path  our  fathers 
trod,  sorely  bested  and  hunted  after,  tear-bedewed  and 
travel-stained,  they  journeyed  there,  passing  on  to  their  God. 
If  the  mother  that  bore  us  were  never  so  rude,  and  to  our 
eyes  might  seem  never  so  graceless  now,  still  she  was 
our  mother,  and  without  her  we  should  not  have  been  born. 
Wives  and  children  may  men  have,  and  manifold  ;  each 
has  but  one  mother.  The  great  institution  we  call  the 
Christian  Church  has  been  the  mother  of  us  all ;  and 
though  in  her  own  dotage  she  deny  our  piety,  and  call  us 
infidel,  far  be  it  from  me  to  withhold  the  richly  earned 
respect.  Behind  a  decent  veil,  then,  let  us  hide  our  mother's 
weakness,  and  ourselves  pass  on.  Once  piety  built  up  a 
theocracy,  and  men  say  it  was  divine ;  now  piety,  every 
where  in  Christendom,  builds  up  democracies  ;  it  is  a  diviner 
work. 

The  piety  of  this  age  must  manifest  itself  in  Morality, 
and  appear  in  a  church  where  the  priests  are  men  of  active 
mind  and  active  hand  ;  men  of  ideas,  who  commune  with 
God  and  man  through  faith  and  works,  finding  no  truth  is 
hostile  to  their  creed,  no  goodness  foreign  to  their  litany, 
no  piety  discordant  with  their  psalm.  The  man  who  once 
would  have  built  a  convent  and  been  its  rigorous  chief,  now 
founds  a  temperance  society,  contends  against  war,  toils  for 
the  pauper,  the  criminal,  the  madman  and  the  slave,  for 
men  bereft  of  senses  and  of  sense.  The  synod  of  Dort  and 
of  Cambridge,  the  assembly  of  divines  at  Westminster,  did 
what  they  could  with  what  piety  they  had  ;  they  put  it  into 
decrees  and  platforms,  into  catechisms  and  creeds.  But 
the  various  conventions  for  reform  put  their  piety  into 


330  SERMON    OF    THE 

resolves  and  then  into  philanthropic  works.  I  do  not  believe 
there  has  ever  been  an  age  when  piety  bore  so  large  a  place 
in  the  whole  being  of  New  England  as  at  this  day,  or 
attendance  on  church-forms  so  small  a  part.  The  attempts 
made  and  making  for  a  better  education  of  the  people,  the 
lectures  on  science  and  literature  abundantly  attended  in 
this  town,  the  increased  fondness  for  reading,  the  better 
class  of  books  which  are  read  —  all  these  indicate  an 
increased  love  of  truth,  the  intellectual  part  of  piety ;  soci- 
eties for  reform  and  for  charity  show  an  increase  of  the  moral 
and  affectional  parts  of  piety  ;  the  better,  the  lovelier  idea 
of  God  which  all  sects  are  embracing,  is  a  sign  of  increased 
love  of  God.  Thus  all  parts  of  piety  are  proving  their 
existence  by  their  work.  The  very  absence  from  the 
churches,  the  disbelief  of  the  old  sour  theologies,  the  very 
neglect  of  outward  forms  and  ceremonies  of  religion,  the 
decline  of  the  ministry  itself,  under  the  present  circum- 
stances, shows  an  increase  of  piety.  The  baby^clothes 
were  well  and  wide  for  the  baby ;  now,  the  fact  that  he 
cannot  get  them  on,  shows  plainly  that  he  has  outgrown 
them,  is  a  boy,  and  no  longer  a  baby. 

Once  Piety  fled  to  the  Church  as  the  only  sanctuary  in 
the  waste  wide  world,  and  was  fondly  welcomed  there,  fed 
and  fostered.  When  power  fled  off  from  the  Church  — 
"  Wilt  thou  also  go  away  ?  "  said  she  ;  "  Lord,"  said  Piety, 
"  to  whom  shall  we  go  ?  Thou  only  hast  the  words  of 
everlasting  life."  Once  convents  and  cathedrals  were  what 
the  world  needed  as  shelter  for  this  fair  child  of  God ;  then 
she  dwelt  in  the  grim  edifice  that  our  fathers  built,  and  for 
a  time  counted  herself  "  lodged  in  a  lodging  where  good 
things  are."  Now  is  she  grown  able  to  wander  forth  fear- 
less and  free,  lodging  where  the  night  overtakes  her,  and 
doing  what  her  hands  find  to  do,  not  unattended  by  the 
Providence  which  hitherto  has  watched  over  and  blest  her. 
I  respect  piety  in  the  Hebrew  saints,  prophets,  and  bards, 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  331 

who  spoke  their  fiery  speech,  or  sung  their  sweet  and  soul- 
inspiring  psalm  : 

"  Out  from  the  heart  of  Nature  rolled 
The  burthens  of  the  Bible  old." 

I  honor  piety  among  the  saints  of  Greece,  clad  in  the  form 
of  philanthropy  and  art,  speaking  still  in  dramas,  in  phi- 
losophies and  song,  and  in  the  temple  and  the  statue  too : 

"  Not  from  a  vain  and  shallow  thought 
His  awful  Jove  young  Phidias  brought." 

I  admire  at  the  piety  of  the  Middle  Ages,  which  founded  the 
monastic  tribes  of  men,  which  wrote  the  theologies,  scho- 
lastic and  mystic  both,  still  speaking  to  the  mind  of  men, 
or  in  poetic  legends  insinuated  truth  ;  which  built  that  heroic 
architecture,  overmastering  therewith  the  sense  and  soul  of 
man  : 

"  The  passive  master  lent  his  hand 
To  the  vast  Soul  that  o'er  him  planned : 
And  the  same  Power  that  reared  the  shrine, 
Bestrode  the  tribes  that  knelt  therein." 

But  the  piety  which  I  find  now,  in  this  age,  here  in  our  own 
land,  I  respect,  honor,  and  admire  yet  more  ;  I  find  it  in  the 
form  of  moral  life  ;  that  is  the  piety  I  love,  piety  in  her  own 
loveliness.  Would  I  could  find  poetic  strains  as  fit  to  sing 
of  her  —  but  yet  such 

"  Loveliness  needs  not  the  foreign  aid  of  ornament, 
But  is,  when  unadorned,  adorned  the  most." 

Let  me  do  no  dishonor  to  other  days,  to  Hebrew  or  to 
Grecian  saints.  Unlike  and  hostile  though  they  were,  they 
jointly  fed  my  soul  in  earliest  days.  I  would  not  underrate 
the  mediaeval  saints,  whose  words  and  works  have  been  my 
study  in  a  manlier  age  ;  yet  I  love  best  the  fair  and  vigorous 
piety  of  our  own  day.  It  is  beautiful,  amid  the  strong,  rank 
life  of  the  nineteenth  century,  amid  the  steam-mills  and  the 


332  SERMON    OF    THE 

telegraphs  which  talk  by  lightning,  amid  the  far-reaching 
enterprises  of  our  time,  and  'mid  the  fierce  democracies  it  is 
beautiful  to  find  this  fragrant  piety  growing  up  in  unwonted 
forms,  in  places  where  men  say  no  seed  of  heaven  can  lodge 
and  germinate.  So  in  a  June  meadow,  when  a  boy,  and 
looking  for  the  cranberries  of  another  year,  faded  and 
tasteless,  amid  the  pale  but  coarse  rank  grass,  and  discon- 
tented that  I  found  them  not,  so  I  have  seen  the  crimson 
arethusa  or  the  cymbidium  shedding  an  unexpected  loveli- 
ness o'er  all  the  watery  soil  and  all  the  pale  and  coarse  rank 
grass,  a  prophecy  of  summer  near  at  hand.  So  in  October, 
when  the  fields  are  brown  with  frost,  the  blue  and  fringed 
gentian  meets  your  eye,  filling  with  thankful  tears. 

There  is  no  decline  of  piety,  but  an  increase  of  it ;  a  good 
deal  has  been  done  in  two  hundred  years,  in  one  hundred 
years,  yes,  in  fifty  years.  Let  us  admit,  with  thankfulness 
of  heart,  that  piety  is  in  greater  proportion  to  all  our  activity 
now  than  ever  before  :  but  then  compare  ourselves  with  the 
ideal  of  human  nature,  our  piety  with  the  ideal  piety,  and 
we  must  confess  that  we  are  little  and  very  low.  Boston  is 
the  most  active  city  in  the  world,  the  most  enterprising.  In 
no  place  is  it  so  easy  to  obtain  men's  ears  and  their  purses 
for  any  good  word  and  work.  But  think  of  the  evils  we 
know  of  and  tolerate  ;  think  of  an  ideal  Christian  city,  then 
think  of  Boston  ;  of  a  Christian  man,  aye  of  Christ  himself, 
and  then  think  of  you  and  me,  and  we  are  filled  with  shame. 
If  there  were  a  truet  manly  piety  in  this  town,  in  due  pro- 
portion to  our  numbers,  wealth,  and  enterprise,  how  long 
would  the  vices  of  this  city  last  ?  How  long  would  men 
complain  of  a  dead  body  of  divinity  and  a  dead  church,  and 
a  ministry  that  was  dead  ?  How  long  would  intemperance 
continue,  and  pauperism,  in  Boston ;  how  long  slavery  in 
this  land  ? 

Last  Sunday,  in  the  name  of  the  poor,  I  asked  you  for 
your  charity.  To-day  I  ask  for  dearer  alms  :  I  ask  you  to 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  333 

contribute  your  piety.  It  will  help  the  town  more  than  the 
little  money  all  of  us  can  give.  Your  money  will  soon  be 
spent  ;  it  feeds  one  man  once  ;  we  cannot  give  it  twice, 
though  the  blessing  thereof  may  linger  long  in  the  hand 
which  gave.  Few  of  us  can  give  much  money  to  the  poor ; 
some  of  us  none  at  all.  This  we  can  all  give  :  the  inspira- 
tion of  a  man  with  a  man's  piety  in  his  heart,  living  it  out 
in  a  man's  life.  Your  money  may  be  ill  spent,  your  charity 
misapplied,  but  your  piety  never.  After  all,  there  is  nothing 
you  can  give  which  men  will  so  readily  take  and  so  long 
remember  as  this.  Mothers  can  give  it  to  their  daughters 
and  their  sons  ;  men,  after  spending  thereof  profusely  at 
home,  can  coin  their  inexhausted  store  into  industry,  pa- 
tience, integrity,  temperance,  justice,  humanity,  a  practical 
love  of  man.  A  thousand  years  ago,  it  was  easy  to  excuse 
men  if  they  chiefly  showed  religion  in  the  conventional 
pattern  of  the  church.  Forms  then  were  helps,  and  the 
nun  has  been  mother  to  much  of  the  charity  of  our  times. 
It  is  easy  to  excuse  our  fathers  for  their  superstitious  rev- 
erence for  rites  and  forms.  But  now,  in  an  age  which  has 
its  eyes  a  little  open,  a  practical  and  a  handy  age,  we  are 
without  excuse  if  our  piety  appears  not  in  a  manly  life,  our 
faith  in  works.  To  give  this  piety  to  cheer  and  bless  man- 
kind, you  must  have  it  first,  be  cheered  and  blessed  thereby 
yourself.  Have  it,  then,  in  your  own  way  ;  put  it  into  your 
own  form.  Do  men  tell  you,  "  This  is  a  degenerate  age," 
and  "  Religion  is  dying  out  ?  "  tell  them  that  when  those 
stars  have  faded  out  of  the  sky  from  very  age,  when  other 
stars  have  come  up  to  take  their  place,  and  they  too  have 
grown  dim  and  hollow-eyed  and  old,  that  religion  will  still 
live  in  man's  heart,  the  primal,  everlasting  light  of  all  our 
being.  Do  they  tell  you  that  you  must  put  piety  into  their 
forms  ;  put  it  there  if  it  be  your  place  ;  if  not,  in  your  place. 
Let  men  see  the  divinity  that  is  in  you  by  the  humanity  that 
comes  out  from  you.  If  they  will  not  see  it,  cannot,  God 
can  and  will.  Take  courage  from  the  past,  not  its  counsel ; 


334 


SERMON    OF    THE 


fear  not  now  to  be  a  man.  You  may  find  a  new  Eden 
where  you  go,  a  river  of  God  in  it,  and  a  tree  of  life,  an 
angel  to  guard  it ;  not  the  warning  angel  to  repel,  but  the 
guiding  angel  to  welcome  and  to  bless. 

It  was  four  years  yesterday  since  I  first  came  here  to 
speak  to  you ;  I  came  hesitatingly,  reluctant,  with  much 
diffidence  as  to  my  power  to  do  what  it  seemed  to  me  was 
demanded.  I  did  not  come  merely  to  pull  down,  but  to 
build  up,  though  it  is  plain  much  theological  error  must  be 
demolished  before  any  great  reform  of  man's  condition  can 
be  brought  about.  I  came  not  to  contend  against  any  man, 
or  sect,  or  party,  but  to  speak  a  word  for  truth  and  religion 
in  the  name  of  man  and  God.  I  was  in  bondage  to  no  sect ; 
you  in  bondage  to  none.  When  a  boy  1  learned  that  there 
is  but  one  religion  though  many  theologies.  I  have  found 
it  in  Christians  and  in  Jews,  in  Quakers  and  in  Catholics.  I 
hope  we  are  all  ready  to  honor  what  is  good  in  each  sect, 
and  in  rejecting  its  evil  not  to  forget  our  love  and  wisdom  in 
our  zeal. 

When  I  came  I  certainly  did  not  expect  to  become  a 
popular  man,  or  acceptable  to  many.  I  had  done  much 
which  in  all  countries  brings  odium  on  a  man,  though  per- 
haps less  in  Boston  than  in  any  other  part  of  the  world.  I 
had  rejected  the  popular  theology  of  Christendom.  I  had 
exposed  the  low  morals  of  society,  had  complained  of  the 
want  of  piety  in  its  natural  form.  I  had  fatally  offended  the 
sect,  small  in  numbers,  but  respectable  for  intelligence  and 
goodness,  in  which  I  was  brought  up.  I  came  to  look  at  the 
signs  of  the  times  from  an  independent  point  of  view,  and  to 
speak  on  the  most  important  of  all  themes.  I  thought  a 
house  much  smaller  than  this  would  be  much  too  large  for 
us.  1  knew  there  would  be  fit  audience;  I  thought  it  would 
be  few,  and  the  few  would  soon  have  heard  enough  and  go 
their  ways. 

I  know  I  have  some  advantages  above  most  clergymen :  I 


SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON.  335 

responsible  to  no  sect ;  no  sect  feels  responsible  for  me  ; 
I  have  rejoiced  at  good  things  which  I  have  seen  in  all  sects; 
the  doctrines  which  I  try  to  teach  do  not  rest  on  tradition,  on 
miracles,  or  on  any  man's  authority ;  only  on  the  nature  of 
num.  I  seek  to  preach  the  natural  laws  of  man.  I  appeal 
to  history  for  illustration,  not  for  authority.  I  have  no  fear 
of  philosophy.  I  am  willing  to  look  a  doubt  fairly  in  the 
face,  and  think  reason  is  sacred  as  conscience,  affection,  or 
the  religious  faculty  in  man.  I  see  a  profound  piety  in 
modern  science.  I  have  aimed  to  set  forth  absolute  religion, 
the  ideal  religion  of  human  nature,  free  piety,  free  good- 
ness, free  thought.  I  call  that  Christianity,  after  the  greatest 
man  of  the  world,  one  who  himself  taught  it ;  but  I  know 
that  this  was  never  the  Christianity  of  the  churches,  in  any 
age.  I  have  endeavored  to  teach  this  religion  and  apply  it 
to  the  needs  of  this  time.  These  things  certainly  give  me 
some  advantages  over  most  other  ministers.  Of  the  disad- 
vantages which  are  personal  to  myself,  I  need  not  speak  in 
public,  but  some  which  come  from  my  position  ought  to  be 
noticed  with  a  word.  The  walls  of  this  house,  the  asso- 
ciations connected  with  it,  furnish  little  help  to  devotion  ;  we 
must  rely  on  ourselves  wholly  for  that.  Other  clergymen, 
by  their  occasional  exchanges,  can  present  their  hearers 
with  an  agreeable  variety  in  substance  and  in  form.  A 
single  man,  often  heard,  becomes  wearisome  and  unpro- 
fitable, for  "No  man  can  feed  us  always."  This  I  feel  to  be 
a  great  disadvantage  which  I  labor  under.  Your  kindness 
and  affectionate  indulgence  make  me  feel  it  all  the  more. 
But  one  man  cannot  be  twenty  men. 

When  I  came  here  I  knew  I  should  hurt  men's  feelings. 
My  theology  would  prove  more  offensive  and  radical  than 
men  thought ;  the  freedom  of  speech  which  men  liked  at  a 
distance  would  not  be  pleasing  when  near  at  hand ;  my 
doctrines  of  morality  I  knew  could  not  be  pleasing  to  all 
men  ;  not  to  all  good  men.  I  saw  by  your  looks  that  in  my 
abstractions  I  did  not  go  too  far  for  your  sympathy,  or  too 


336  SPIRITUAL    CONDITION    OF    BOSTON. 

fast  for  your  following.  I  soon  found  that  my  highest 
thought"  and  most  pious  sentiment  were  most  warmly  wel- 
comed as  such  ;  but  when  I  came  to  put  abstract  thought  and 
mystical  piety  into  concrete  goodness,  and  translate  what 
you  had  accepted  as  Christian  faith  into  daily  life ;  when  I 
came  to  apply  piety  to  trade,  politics,  life  in  general,  I  knew 
that  I  should  hurt  men's  feelings.  It  could  not  be  otherwise. 
Yet  I  have  had  a  most  patient  and  faithful  hearing.  One 
thing  I  must  do  in  my  preaching :  I  must  be  in  earnest.  I 
cannot  stand  here  before  you  and  before  God,  attempting  to 
teach  piety  and  goodness,  and  not  feel  the  fire  and  show  ihe 
fire.  The  greater  the  wrong,  the  more  popular,  the  more 
must  I  oppose  it,  and  with  the  clearer,  abler  speech.  It  is 
not  necessary  for  me  to  be  popular,  to  be  acceptable,  even 
to  be  loved.  It  is  necessary  that  I  should  tell  the  truth.  But 
let  that  pass.  You  come  hither  week  after  week,  it  is  now 
year  after  year  that  you  come,  to  listen  to  one  humble  man. 
Do  you  get  poor  in  your  souls  ?  Does  your  religion  become 
poor  and  low  ?  Are  you  getting  less  in  the  qualities  of  a 
man  ?  If  so,  then  leave  me,  to  empty  seats,  to  cold  and 
voiceless  walls ;  go  elsewhere,  and  feed  your  souls  with  a 
wise  passiveness,  or  an  activity  wiser  yet.  Such  is  your 
duty ;  let  no  affection  for  me  hinder  you  from  performing  it. 
The  same  theology,  the  same  form  suits  not  all  men.  But 
if  it  is  not  so,  if  I  do  you  good,  if  you  grow  in  mind,  and 
conscience,  heart  and  soul,  then  I  ask  one  thing  —  Let  your 
piety  become  natural  life,  your  divinity  become  humanity. 


* 


\ 


XII. 

SOME   THOUGHTS  ON  THE    MOST    CHRISTIAN    USE  OF  THE  SUNDAY.    A 
SERMON    PREACHED    AT    THE    MELODEON,    ON    SUNDAY,    JANUARY 

30,   1848. 


MARK    II.    27. 
TUB  SABBATH   WAS  MADE   FOR  MAS,   AND   NOT  MAN   FOR   THE   SABBATH. 

FROM  past  ages  we  have  received  many  valuable  institu- 
tions, that  have  grown  out  of  the  transient  wants  or  the  per- 
manent nature  of  man.  Amongst  these  are  two  which  have 
done  a  great  service  in  promoting  the  civilization  of  man- 
kind, which  still  continue  amongst  us.  I  speak  now  of  the 
institution  of  Sunday,  and  that  of  preaching.  By  the  one, 
a  seventh  part  of  the  time  is  separated  from  the  common 
pursuits  of  life,  in  order  that  it  may  be  devoted  to  bodily 
relaxation,  and  to  the  culture  of  the  spiritual  powers  of 
man  ;  by  the  other,  a  large  body  of  men,  in  most  countries 
the  best  educated  class,  are  devoted  to  the  cultivation  of 
these  spiritual  powers.  Such  at  least  is  the  theory  of  those 
two  institutions,  be  their  effect  in  practice  what  it  may. 
This  morning,  let  us  look  at  one  of  them,  and  so  I  invite 
your  attention  to  some  thoughts  relative  to  the  Sunday  —  to 
the  most  Christian  and  profitable  use  of  that  day. 

There  is  a  stricter  party  of  Christians  amongst  us,  who 
speak  out  their  opinions  concerning  the  Sunday  ;  this  com- 
prises what  are  commonly  called  the  more  "  evangelical " 
sects.     There  is  a  party  less  strict   in   many  particulars, 
29 


338  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

comprising  what  are  commonly  called  the  more  "  liberal  " 
sects.  They  have  hitherto  been  comparatively  silent  on 
this  theme.  Their  opinions  about  the  Sunday  have  not 
usually  been  so  plainly  spoken  out,  but  have  been  made 
apparent  by  their  actions,  by  occasional  and  passing  words, 
rather  than  by  full,  distinct,  and  emphatic  declarations. 
The  stricter  party,  of  late  years,  have  been  growing  a  little 
more  strict ;  the  party  less  strict  likewise  advance  in  the 
opposite  direction.  Recently,  a  call  has  been  published  by 
a  few  men,  for  a  convention  to  consult  and  take  some  steps 
towards  the  less  rigid  course,  for  the  purpose,  as  I  under- 
stand it,  of  making  the  Sunday  even  more  valuable  than  it 
is  now.  I  take  it  for  granted  that  both  parties  desire  to 
make  the  best  possible  use  of  the  Sunday  —  the  use  most 
conducive  to  the  highest  interests  of  mankind ;  that  they 
desire  this  equally.  There  are  good  men  on  both  sides,  the 
more  and  the  less  strict ;  pious  men,  in  the  best  sense  of 
that  word,  may  be  found  on  both  sides.  There  is  no  need 
of  imputing  bad  motives  to  either  party  in  order  to  explain 
the  difference  between  the  two. 

Such  is  the  aspect  of  the  two  parties  in  the  field,  looking 
opposite  ways,  but  at  one  another.  It  seems  likely  that 
there  will  be  a  quarrel,  and,  as  is  usual  in  such  cases,  hard 
words  on  each  side,  hard  thoughts  and  unkind  feelings  on 
both  sides.  Before  the  quarrel  begins,  and  our  eyes  are 
blinded  by  the  dust  of  controversy ;  before  our  blood  is 
fired,  and  we  become  wholly  incapable  of  judgment  —  let 
us  look  coolly  at  the  matter,  and  ask,  Do  we  need  any 
change  in  respect  to  the  observance  of  the  Sunday  ?  Are 
the  present  opinions  respecting  the  origin,  nature,  and 
original  design  of  that  institution  just  and  true  ?  Is  the 
present  mode  of  observing  it  the  most  profitable  that  can  be 
devised  ?  The  inquiry  is  one  of  great  importance. 

To  answer  these  questions,  it  is  necessary  to  go  back  a 
little  into  the  history  of  the  Hebrew  Sabbath  and  the  Chris- 
tian Sunday.  However,  it  is  not  needful  to  go  much  into 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  339 

detail,  or  consume  this  precious  hour  in  a  learned  discussion 
OH  antiquarian  matters  which  concern  none  but  scholars. 

With  the  Hebrews  the  actual  observance  of  Saturday  — 
the  Sabbath  —  as  a  day  of  rest,  seems  to  be  of  pretty 
late  origin.  The  first  mention  of  it  in  authentic  Hebrew 
history,  as  actually  observed,  occurs  about  two  hundred 
years  after  Samuel,  and  about  six  hundred  after  Moses  —  a 
little  less  than  nine  hundred  before  Christ.  The  passage  is 
found  in  2  Kings  iv.  23  :  a  child  had  died,  as  the  narrative 
relates  —  the  mother  wished  to  send  for  Elisha,  "  the  man 
of  God."  Her  husband  objects,  saying,  "  Wherefore  wilt 
thou  go  to  him  to-day  ?  it  is  neither  new  moon  nor  Sab- 
bath." This  connection  with  the  new  moon  is  significant. 
In  the  earlier  historical  books  of  Joshua,  Judges,  the  4wo 
books  of  Samuel,  and  the  first  of  Kings,  there  is  no  mention 
of  the  Sabbath,  not  the  least  allusion  to  it. 

This  s.eems  to  have  been  the  origin  of  its  observance  :  — 
The  worship  of  one  God,  with  the  distinctive  name  Jehovah, 
gradually  got  established  in  the  Hebrew  nation  ;  for  this 
they  seem  largely  indebted  to  Moses.  Gradually  this  wor- 
ship of  Jehovah  became  connected  with  a  body  of  priests, 
who  were  regularly  organized  at  length,  and  claimed  de- 
scent from  Levi  —  some  of  them  from  Aaron,  his  celebrated 
descendant,  the  elder  brother  of  Moses.  The  rise  of  the 
Levitical  priesthood  is  remarkable,  and  easily  traced  in  the 
Old  Testament.  Some  books  are  entirely  destitute  of  a 
Levitical  spirit,  such  as  Genesis  and  Judges  ;  others  are 
filled  with  it,  as  Leviticus,  Deuteronomy,  and  the  books  of 
Chronicles.  With  the  priesthood  it  seems  there  came  the 
observance  of  certain  days  for  religious  or  festal  purposes 
—  New  Moon  days,  Full  Moon  days,  and  the  like.  These 
seem  to  have  been  derived  from  the  nations  about  them, 
with  whom  the  moon — deified  as  Astarte,  the  Queen  and 
Mother  of  Heaven,  and  under  other  names  —  was  long  an 
object  of  worship.  The  observance  of  those  days  points 
back  to  the  period  when  Fetichism,  the  worship  of  Nature, 


340  THOUGHTS    OX    THE    MOST 

was  the  prominent  form  of  religion.  With  the  other  days 
of  religious  observance  came  the  seventh  day,  called  the 
Sabbath.  No  one  laiows  its  true  historical  origin.  The 
statement  respecting  its  origin,  in  the  fourth  command- 
ment, and  elsewhere  in  the  Old  Testament,  can  hardly  be 
accepted  as  literally  true  by  any  one  in  this  century.  No 
scientific  man,  in  the  present  stage  of  philosophic  inquiry, 
will  believe  that  God  created  the  universe  in  six  days,  and 
then  rested  on  the  seventh.  Did  other  nations  observe  this 
day  before  the  Hebrews  ;  was  it  also  connected  with  some 
Fetichistic  form  of  worship  ;  what  was  the  historical  event 
which  led  to  the  selection  of  that  day  in  special  ?  This 
it  is  easy  to  ask,  but  perhaps  not  possible  to  answer.  These 
are  curious  questions  ;  they  are  of  little  practical  impor- 
tance to  us  at  this  moment. 

After  the  Hebrew  institutions  of  religion  got  fixed  —  the 
worship  of  Jehovah,  the  Levitical  priesthood,  and  the  peculiar 
forms  of  sacrifice  —  it  became  common  to  refer  their  origin 
back  to  the  time  of  Moses,  a  man  who  lived  fourteen  or 
fifteen  hundred  years  before  Christ.  Since  few  memorials 
from  his  age  have  come  down  to  us,  it  is  plain  we  can  know 
little  of  him.  But  from  the  impression  which  his  character 
left  on  his  nation,  and  through  them  on  the  whole  world  ; 
from  the  myths  so  early  connected  with  his  name,  it  seems 
pretty  clear  that  he  was  one  of  the  greatest  and  most  extra- 
ordinary men  that  ever  lived.  Mankind  seldom  tell  great 
things  of  little  men.  It  is  difficult  to  say  what  share  he  had 
in  making  the  laws  of  the  Hebrew  nation  which  are  com- 
monly referred  to  him,  —  and,  as  it  is  popularly  taught, 
revealed  to  him  directly  by  Jehovah.  Perhaps  we  are  not 
safe  in  referring  to  him  even  the  whole  of  the  ten  com- 
mandments ;  surely  not  in  any  one  of  their  present  forms.* 

*  These  celebrated  commandments  have  come  down  to  us  in  three 
distinct  forms  ;  namely,  in  Exodus  xx.,  in  Exodus  xxxiv.,  and  in. 
Deut.  v.  The  differences  between  these  several  codes  are  quite  re- 
markable and  significant. 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  341 

Was  the  Sabbath  observed  as  a  day  of  rest  before  Moses  ? 
Was  its  observance  enforced  by  him  ?  Was  it  even  known 
to  him  ?  These  are  questions  not  easily  answered.  This 
only  is  certain  :  from  the  time  of  Moses  to  that  of  Jehoram, 
a  period  of  about  six  hundred  years,  there  is  no  historical 
mention  of  its  observance,  not  the  least  allusion  to  it.  Yet 
we  have  documents  which  treat  of  that  period,  —  the  books 
of  Joshua,  Judges,  Samuel,  and  the  Kings,  —  some  of  them 
historical  documents,  which  go  into  the  minute  detail  of.  the 
national  peculiarities,  and  were  evidently  written  with  a  good 
deal  of  concern  for  strict  integrity  and  truth  ;  they  refer  to 
the  national  rite  of  circumcision.  Now,  if  the  Sabbath  had 
been  observed  during  that  period,  it  is  difficult  to  believe  it 
would  have  received  no  passing  notice  in  those  historical 
books.  But  not  only  is  there  no  mention  of  it  therein,  none 
even  in  the  times  of  David  and  Solomon,  who  favored  the 
priesthood  so  strongly  ;  but  in  the  book  of  Chronicles,  the 
most  Levitical  book  in  the  Bible,  at  a  date  more  than  two 
hundred  years  later  than  the  time  of  Jehoram,  it  is  distinctly 
declared  that  the  Sabbath  had  not  been  kept  for  nearly  five 
hundred  years.*  But  even  if  this  statement  is  true,  which 
is  scarcely  probable,  it  is  plain  from  the  frequent  mention  of 
the  Sabbath  in  the  writings  of  the  prophets  of  the  latter  part 
of  that  period  —  Isaiah,  Jeremiah,  and  others  —  that  the 
institution  was  one  well  known  and  highly  regarded  by 
religious  men.  After  the  return  from  the  Babylonian  exile, 
it  seems  to  have  been  kept  with  considerable  rigor ;  this  we 
learn  from  the  book  of  Nehemiah. 

The  Hebrew  law,  as  it  is  contained  in  the  Pentateuch,  is 
a  singular  mixture  of  conflicting  statutes,  evidently  belonging 
to  different  ages,  many  of  them  wholly  unsuitable  to  the 
condition  of  the  people  when  the  laws  are  alleged  to  have 
been  given.  However,  they  are  all  referred  back  to  the 
time  of  Moses  in  the  Pentateuch  itself,  and  by  the  popular 

*  2  Chron.  xxxvi.  21. 
29* 


342  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

theology  at  the  present  day.  In  the  law  the  command  is 
given  to  keep  the  seventh  day  as  a  day  of  rest,  and  that 
command  is  referred  distinctly  to  Jehovah  himself.  The 
reason  is  given  for  choosing  that  day  : — "For  in  six  days 
the  Lord  made  heaven  and  earth,  and  on  the  seventh  day  he 
rested  and  was  refreshed;"  the  Sabbath,  therefore,  was  to 
be  kept  in  commemoration  of  the  fact,  that  after  Jehovah 
had  spent  the  week  in  creating  the  world,  "  he  rested  and 
was  refreshed."  It  was  to  be  a  day  of  rest  for  master  and 
slave,  for  man  and  beast.  A  special  sacrifice  was  offered 
on  that  day,  in  addition  to  the  usual  ceremonies,  but  no  pro- 
vision was  made  for  the  religious  instruction  of  the  people. 
The  Sabbath  was  what  its  Hebrew  name  implies,  a  rest  from 
all  labor.  The  law,  in  general  terms,  forbade  all  work ; 
but,  not  content  with  that,  it  descends  to  minute  details, 
specifically  prohibiting  by  statute  the  gathering  or  pre- 
paration of  food  on  the  Sabbath,  even  of  food  to  be  con- 
sumed on  that  day  itself;  the  lighting  of  a  fire,  or  the 
removal  from  one's  place ;  and,  by  a  decision  where  the 
statute  did  not  apply,  forbade  the  gathering  of  sticks  of 
wood.  The  punishment  for  violating  the  Sabbath  in  general, 
or  in  any  one  of  these  particulars,  was  death  ;  "  Who- 
soever doeth  work  therein  shall  be  put  to  death."  However, 
amusement  was  not  prohibited,  nor  eating  and  drinking, 
only  work.  The  command,  "  Let  no  man  go  out  of  his  place 
on  the  seventh  day,"  at  a  later  period,  was  liberally  inter- 
preted, and  a  man  was  allowed  to  go  two  thousand  cubits,  a 
Sabbath-day's  journey. 

Long  after  the  time  of  Moses,  some  of  the  Hebrews 
returned  from  exile  amongst  a  more  civilized  and  refined 
people.  It  seems  probable  that  only  the  stricter  portion 
returned  and  established  themselves  in  the  land  of  their 
fathers.  Nehemiah,  their  leader,  enforced,  the  observance 
of  the  Sabbath  with  a  strictness  and  rigor  of  which  earlier 
times  afford  no  evidence.  But  the  nation  was  not  content 
with  making  it  a  day  of  idleness.  They  established  syna- 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  343 

gogues,  where  the  people  freely  assembled  on  the  Sabbath 
and  other  public  days,  for  religious  instruction,  and  thus 
founded  an  excellent  institution  which  has  shown  itself 
fruitful  of  good  results.  So  far  as  I  know,  that  is  the  earliest 
instance  on  record  of  provision  being  made  for  the  regular 
religious  instruction  of  the  whole  people.  Experience  has 
shown  its  value,  and  now  all  the  most  highly  civilized 
nations  of  the  earth  have  established  similiar  institutions. 
However,  in  the  synagogues  the  business  of  religious  in- 
struction was  not  at  all  in  the  hands  of  the  priests,  but  in 
those  of  the  people,  acting  in  their  primary  character  with- 
out regard  to  Levitical  establishments.  A  priest,  as  such,  is 
never  an  instructor  of  the  people  ;  he  is  to  go  through  his 
ritual,  not  beyond  it. 

It  is  easy  to  learn  from  the  New  Testament  what  were  the 
current  opinions  about  the  Sabbath  in  the  time  of  Christ. 
It  was  unlawful  to  gather  a  head  of  wheat  on  the  Sabbath, 
as  a  man  walked  through  the  fields ;  it  was  unlawful  to  cure 
a  sick  man,  though  that  cure  could  be  effected  by  a  touch  or 
a  word  ;  unlawful  for  a  man  to  walk  home  and  carry  the 
light  cushion  on  which  he  had  lain.  What  was  unlawful 
was  reckoned  wicked  also  ;  for  what  is  a  crime  in  the  eyes 
of  the  priest,  he  commonly  pretends  is  likewise  a  sin  before 
the  eyes  of  God.  '  Yet  it  was  not  unlawful  to  eat,  drink,  and 
be  merry  on  the  Sabbath ;  nor  to  lift  a  sheep  out  of  the 
ditch ;  nor  to  quarrel  with  a  man  who  came  to  deliver  man- 
kind from  their  worst  enemies.  It  was  lawful  to  perform 
the  rite  of  circumcision  on  the  Sabbath,  but  unlawful  to 
cure  a  man  of  any  sickness.  Jesus  once  placed  these  two, 
the  allowing  of  that  ritual  mutilation  and  the  prohibition  of 
the  humane  act  of  curing  the  sick  on  the  Sabbath,  in  ridic- 
ulous contrast.  In  the  fourth  gospel  he  goes  further,  and 
actually  denies  the  alleged  ground  for  the  original  institution 
of  the  Sabbath  ;  he  denies  that  God  had  ever  ceased  from 
his  work,  or  rested  :  "  My  father  worketh  hitherto."  *  How- 

*  John  v.  1  -  18,"  and  vii.  19  -  24. 


344  THOUGHTS    OX    THE    MOST 

ever,  in  effecting  these  cures  he  committed  a  capital  offence ; 
the  Pharisees  so  regarded  it,  and  took  measures  to  insure 
his  punishnent.  It  does  not  appear  that  they  were  illegal 
measures.  It  is  probable  they  took  regular  and  legal  means 
to  bring  him  to  condign  punishment  as  a  Sabbath-breaker. 
He  escaped  by  flight. 

Such  was  the  Sabbath  with  the  Hebrews,  such  the  re- 
corded opinion  of  Jesus  concerning  it.  There  were  also 
other  days  in  which  labor  was  forbidden,  but  with  them  we 
have  nothing  to  do  at  present.  Jesus  taught  piety  and 
goodness  without  the  Hebrew  limitations ;  of  course,  then, 
the  new  wine  of  Christianity  could  not  be  put  into  the  old 
bottles  of  the  Jews.  Their  fast  days  and  Sabbath  days,  their 
rites  and  forms,  were  not  for  him. 

Now,  not  long  after  the  death  of  Christ,  his  followers 
became  gradually  divided  into  two  parties.  First,  there 
were  the  Jewish  Christians;  that  was  the  oldest  portion,  the 
old  school  of  Christians.  They  are  mentioned  in  eccle- 
siastical history  as  the  Ebionites,  Nazarenes,  and  under  yet 
other  names.  Peter  and  James  were  the  great  men  in  that 
division  of  the  early  Christians.  Matthew,  and  the  author 
of  the  Gospel  according  to  the  Hebrews,  were  their  evan- 
gelists. The  church  at  Jerusalem  was  their  strong  hold. 
They  kept  the  whole  Hebrew  law ;  all  its  burthensome 
ritual,  its  circumcision  and  its  sacrifices,  its  new-moon  days 
and  its  full-moon  days,  Sabbath,  fasts,  and  feasts ;  the  first 
fifteen  bishops  of  the  church  at  Jerusalem  were  circumcised 
Jews.  It  seems  to  me  they  misunderstood  Jesus  fatally  ; 
counting  him  nothing  but  the  Messiah  of  the  Old  Testament, 
and  Christianity,  therefore,  nothing  but  Judaism  brightened 
up  and  restored  to  its  original  purity. 

I  have  often  mentioned  how  strongly  Matthew,  taking 
him  for  the  author  of  the  first  gospel,  favors  this  way  of 
thinking.  He  represents  Jesus  as  commanding  his  disciples 
to  observe  all  the  Mosaic  law,  as  the  Pharisees  interpreted 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  345 

that  law,*  though  such  a  command  is  utterly  inconsistent 
with  the  general  spirit  of  Christ's  teachings,  and  even  with 
his  plain  declaration,  as  preserved  in  other  parts  of  the  same 
gospel.  It  is  worthy  of  note,  that  this  command  is  peculiar 
to  Matthew.  But  there  is  another  instance  of  the  same 
Jewish  tendency,  though  not  so  obvious  at  first  sight.  Mat- 
thew represents  Jesus  as  saying,  "  The  Son  of  man,"  that 
is,  the  Messiah,  "  is  Lord  even  of  the  Sabbath  day."  Ac- 
cordingly, he  is  competent  to  expound  the  law  correctly, 
and  determine  what  is  lawful  to  do  on  that  day.  In  Matthew, 
therefore,  Jesus,  in  his  character  of  Messiah,  is  represented 
as  giving  a  judicial  opinion,  and  ruling  that  it  "  is  lawful  to 
do  well  on  the  Sabbath  days."  Now,  Mark  and  Luke  repre- 
sent it  a  little  different.  In  Mark,  Jesus  himself  declares 
that  "  The  Sabbath  was  made  for  man,  and  not  man  for 
the  Sabbath."  Matthew  entirely  omits  that  remarkable 
saying.  According  to  Mark,  Jesus  declares  in  general 
terms,  that  man  is  of  more  consequence  than  the  observance 
of  the  Sabbath,  while  Matthew  only  considers  that  the  Messiah 
is  "  Lord  of  the  Sabbath  day."  The  cause  of  this  diver- 
sity is  quite  plain.  Matthew  was  a  Jewish  Christian,  and 
thought  Christianity  was  nothing  but  restored  Judaism. 

The  other  party  may  be  called  liberal  Christians,  though 
they  must  not  be  confounded  with  the  party  which  now  bears 
that  name.  They  were  the  new  school  of  the  early  Chris- 
tians. They  rejected  the  Hebrew  law,  so  far  as  it  did  not 
rest  on  human  nature,  and  considered  that  Christianity  was 
a  new  thing ;  Christ,  not  a  mere  Jew,  but  a  universal  man, 
who  had  thrown  down  the  wall  of  partition  between  Jews  and 
Gentiles.  All  the  old,  artificial  distinctions,  therefore,  were 
done  away  with  at  once.  Paul  was  the  head  of  the  liberal 
party  among  the  primitive  Christians.  He  was  considered 
a  heretic ;  and  though  he  was  more  efficient  than  any  of  the 

*  Matth.  xxiii.  1-3. 


346  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

other  early  preachers  of  Christianity,  yet  the  author  of  the 
Apocalypse  thought  him  not  worthy  of  a  place  in  the  foun- 
dation of  the  new  Jerusalem,  which  rests  on  the  twelve 
apostles.*  The  fourth  gospel,  with  peculiarities  of  its  own, 
is  written  wholly  in  the  interest  of  this  party  ;  James  is  not 
mentioned  in  it  at  all,  and  Peter  plays  but  a  quite  subordi- 
nate part,  and  is  thrown  into  the  shade  by  John.  The  dis- 
ciples are  spoken  of  as  often  misunderstanding  their  great 
Teacher.  These  peculiarities  cannot  be  considered  as  acci- 
dental ;  they  are  monuments  of  the  controversy  then  going 
on  between  the  two  parties.  Paul  stood  in  direct  opposition 
to  the  Jewish  Christians.  This  is  plain  from  the  epistle  to 
the  Galatians,  in  which  the  heads  of  the  rival  sects  appear 
very  unlike  the  description  given  of  them  in  the  book  of 
Acts.  The  observance  of  Jewish  sacred  days  was  one  of 
the  subjects  of  controversy.  Let  us  look  only  at  the  matter 
of  the  Sabbath,  as  it  came  in  question  between  the  two  par- 
ties. Paul  exalts  Christ  far  above  the  Messianic  predictions 
of  the  Old  Testament,  calling  him  an  image  of  the  invisible 
God,  and  declaring  that  all  the  fullness  of  divinity  dwells  in 
him,  and  adds,  that  he  had  annulled  the  old  Hebrew  law. 
"  Therefore,"  says  Paul,  "  let  no  man  judge  you  in  meat  or 
in  drink,  or  in  respect  of  a  holy  day,  or  of  the  new  moon,  or 
of  the  Sabbath."  t  Here  he  distinctly  states  the  issue  be- 
tween the  two  Christian  sects.  Elsewhere  he  speaks  of  the 
Jewish  party,  as  men  that  "  would  pervert  the  gospel  of 
Christ,"  by  teaching  that  a  man  was  "justified  by  the 
works  of  the  law  ;  "  that  is,  by  a  minute  observance  of  the 
Hebrew  ritual.}  Paul  rejects  the  authority  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament. The  law  of  Moses  was  but  a  schoolmaster's  ser- 
vant, to  bring  us  to  Christ ;  man  had  come  to  Christ,  and 
needed  that  servant  no  longer  ;  the  law  was  a  taskmaster 
and  guardian  set  over  man  in  his  minority,  now  he  had  come 
of  age,  and  was  free ;  the  law  was  a  shadow  of  good  things, 

*  Rev.  xxi.  14.  i  Coloss.  ii.  16.  $  Galat.  i.  -  v. 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  347 

and  they  had  come  ;  it  was  a  law  of  sin  and  death,  which 
no  man  could  bear,  and  now  the  law  of  the  spirit  of  life,  as 
revealed  by  Jesus  Christ,  had  made  men  free  from  the  law 
of  sin  and  death.  Such  was  the  work  of  the  glorious  gos- 
pel of  the  blessed  God.  Thus  sweeping  off  the  authority 
of  the  old  law  in  general,  he  proceeds  to  particulars :  he 
rejects  circumcision,  and  the  offering  of  sacrifices  ;  rejects 
the  distinction  of  nations  as  Jew  and  Gentile  ;  the  distinction 
of  meats  as  clean  and  unclean,  and  all  distinction  of  days, 
as  holy  and  not  holy.  If  'one  man  thought  one  day  holier 
than  another  day ;  if  another  man  thought  all  days  equally 
holy,  he  would  have  each  man  true  to  his  conviction,  but 
not  seek  to  impose  that  conviction  on  his  brothers.  Such 
was  Paul's  opinion  of  "  The  law  of  Moses ; "  such,  of  the 
Sabbath  ;  the  Christians  were  not  "  subject  to  ordinances." 

Let  us  come  now  to  the  common  practice  of  the  early 
Christians.  The  apostles  went  about  and  preached  Christi- 
anity, as  they  severally  understood  it.  They  spoke  as  they 
found  opportunity ;  on  the  Sabbath  to  the  Jews  in  the  syna- 
gogues, and  on  other  days,  as  they  found  time  and  hearers. 
It  does  not  appear  from  the  New  Testament,  that  they 
limited  themselves  to  any  particular  day ;  they  were  mis- 
sionaries, some  of  them  remained  but  a  little  while  in  a 
place,  making  the  most  of  their  time.  It  seems  that  the 
early  Christians,  who  lived  in  large  towns,  met  every  day 
for  religious  purposes.  But  as  that  would  be  found  incon- 
venient, one  day  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  regular  time  of 
their  meetings.  The  Jewish  Christians  observed  the  Sab- 
bath with  pharisaic  rigor,  while  the  liberal  Christians  ne- 
glected it.  But  both  parties  of  Christians  observed,  at 
length,  the  first  day  of  the  week  as  a  peculiar  day.  No 
one  knows  when  this  observance  of  the  Sunday  began ;  it 
is  difficult  to  find  proof  in  the  New  Testament,  that  the 
apostles  regarded  it  as  a  peculiar  day ;  it  seems  plain  that 
Paul  did  not.  But  it  is  certain,  that  in  the  second  century 


348  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

after  Jesus,  the  Christians  in  general  did  so  regard  it,  and 
perhaps  all  of  them. 

Why  was  the  Sunday  chosen  as  the  regular  day  for  reli- 
gious meeting  ?  It  was  regarded  as  the  day  on  which  Jesus 
rose  from  the  dead  ;  and,  following  the  mythical  account  in 
Genesis,  it  was  the  day  on  which  God  began  the  creation, 
and  actually  created  the  light.  Here  there  were  two  rea- 
sons for  the  selection  of  that  day ;  both  are  frequently  men- 
tioned by  the  early  Christian  writers.  Sunday,  therefore, 
was  to  them  a  symbol  of  the  new  creation,  and  of  the  light 
that  had  come  into  the  world.  The  liberal  Christians,  in 
separating  from  the  Jewish  Sabbath,  would  naturally  exalt 
the  new  religious  day.  Athanasius,  I  think,  is  the  first 
who  ascribes  a  divine  origin  to  the  institution  of  Sunday. 
He  says,  "  The  Lord  changed  this  day  from  the  Sabbath  to 
the  Sunday ; "  but  Athanasius  lived  three  centuries  after 
Christ,  and  seems  to  have  known  little  about  the  matter. 

The  officers  and  the  order  of  services  in  the  churches  on 
the  Sunday  seem  derived  from  the  usages  of  the  Jewish 
synagogues.  The  Sunday  was  thus  observed :  the  people 
came  together  in  the  morning ;  the  exercises  consisted  of 
readings  from  the  Old  Testament  and  such  writings  of  the 
Christians  as  the  assembly  saw  fit  to  have  read  to  them. 
In  respect  to  these  writings  there  was  a  wide  difference  in 
the  different  churches,  some  accepting  more  and  others  less. 
The  overseer,  or  bishop,  made  an  address,  perhaps  an  expo- 
sition of  the  passage  of  Scripture.  Prayers  were  said  and 
hymns  chanted  ;  the  Lord's  supper  was  celebrated.  The 
form  no  doubt  differed,  and  widely,  too,  in  different  places. 
It  was  not  the  form  of  servitude  but  the  spirit  of  freedom, 
they  observed.  But  all  these  things  were  done,  likewise, 
on  other  days ;  the  Lord's  supper  could  be  celebrated  on 
any  day,  and  is  on  every  day  by  the  Catholic  Church,  even 
now ;  for  the  Catholics  have  been  true  to  the  early  practices 
in  more  points  than  the  Protestants  are  willing  to  admit.  In 
some  places  it  is  certain  there  was  a  "  communion  "  every 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  349 

day.  Sunday  was  regarded  holy  by  the  early  Christians, 
just  as  certain  festivals  are  regarded  holy  by  the  Catholics, 
the  Episcopalians,  and  the  Lutherans,  at  this  day  ;  as  the 
New  Englanders  regard  Thanksgiving  day  as  holy.  Other 
days,  likewise,  were  regarded  as  holy;  were  used  in  the 
same  manner  as  the  Sunday.  Such  days  were  observed  in 
honpr  of  particular  events  in  the  life  of  Jesus,  or  in  honor 
of  saints  and  martyrs,  or  they  were  days  consecrated  by 
older  festivals  belonging  to  the  more  ancient  forms  of  reli- 
gion. In  the  Catholic  church  such  days  are  still  numerous. 
It  is  only  the  Puritans  who  have  completely  rejected  them, 
and  they  have  been  obliged  to  substitute  new  ones  in  their 
place.  However,  there  was  one  peculiarity  of  the  Sunday 
which  distinguished  it  from  most  or  all  other  days.  It  was 
,  a  day  of  religious  rejoicing.  On  other  days  the  Christians 
knelt  in  prayer :  on  the  Sunday  they  stood  up  on  joyful 
feet,  for  light  had  come  into  the  world.  Sunday  was  a  day 
of  gladness  and  rejoicing.  The  early  Christians  had  many 
fasts;  they  were  commonly  held  on  Wednesdays  and  Fri- 
days, often  on  Saturday  also,  the  more  completely  to  get  rid 
of  the  Jewish  superstition  which  consecrated  that  day ; 
but  on  Sunday  there  must  be  no  fast.  He  would  be  a  her- 
etic who  should  fast  on  Sunday.  It  is  strictly  forbidden  in 
the  "  canons  of  the  apostles ; "  a  clergyman  must  be  de- 
graded and  a  layman  excommunicated,  for  the  offence. 
Says  St.  Ignatius,  in  the  second  century,  if  the  epistle  be 
genuine,  "  Every  lover  of  Christ  feasts  on  the  Lord's  day." 
"  We  deem  it  wicked,"  says  Tertullian,  in  the  third  century, 
"  to  fast  on  the  Sunday,  or  to  pray  on  our  knees."  "  Oh," 
says  St.  Jerome,  "  that  we  could  fast  on  the  Sunday,  as 
Paul  did  and  they  that  were  with  him."  St.  Ambrose  says, 
the  "  Manichees  were  damned  for  fasting  on  the  Lord's 
day."  At  this  day  the  Catholic  church  allows  no  fast  on 
Sunday,  save  the  Sunday  before  the  crucifixion ;  even  Lent 
ceases  on  that  day. 

It  does  not  appear  that  labor  ceased  on  Sunday,  in  the 
30 


350  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

earliest  age  of  Christianity.  But  when  Sunday  became  the 
regular  and  most  important  day  for  holding  religious  meet- 
ings, less  labor  must  of  course  be  performed  on  that  day. 
At  length  it  became  common  in  some  places  to  abstain 
from  ordinary  work  on  the  Sunday.  It  is  not  easy  to  say 
how  early  this  was  brought  about.  But  after  Christianity 
had  become  "  respectable,"  and  found  its  way  to  the  ranks 
of  the  wealthy,  cultivated  and  powerful,  laws  got  enacted 
in  its  favor.  Now,  the  Romans,  like  all  other  ancient 
nations,  had  certain  festal  days  in  which  it  was  not  thought 
proper  to  labor  unless  work  was  pressing.  It  was  disrepu- 
table to  continue  common  labor  on  such  days  without  an 
urgent  reason ;  they  were  pretty  numerous  in  the  Roman 
calendar.  Courts  did  not  sit  on  those  days ;  no  public 
business  was  transacted.  They  were  observed  as  Christ- 4 
mas  and  the  more  important  saints'  days  in  Catholic  coun- 
tries ;  as  Thanksgiving  day  and  the  Fourth  of  July  with  us. 
•  In  the  year  three  hundred  and  twenty-one,  Constantine,  the 
first  Christian  emperor  of  Rome,  placed  Sunday  among  their 
ferial  days.  This  was  perhaps  the  first  legislative  action 
concerning  the  day.  The  statute  forbids  labor  in  towns,  but 
expressly  excludes  all  prohibition  of  field-labor  in  the  coun- 
try.* About  three  hundred  and  sixty-six  or  seven,  the 
Council  of  Laodicea  decreed  that  Christians  "  ought  not  to 
Judaize  and  be  idle  on  the  Sabbath,  but  to  work  on  that 
day ;  especially  observing  the  Lord's  day,  and  if  it  is  pos- 
sible, as  Christians,  resting  from  labor."  Afterwards  the 
Emperor  Theodosius  forbade  certain  public  games  on  Sun- 
day, Christmas,  Epiphany,  and  the  whole  time  from  Easter 
to  Pentecost.  Justinian  likewise  forbade  theatrical  exhibi- 
tions, races  in  the  circus,  and  the  fights  of  wild  beasts,  on 
Sunday,  under  severe  penalties.  This  was  done  in  order 
that  the  religious  services  of  the  Christians  might  not  be 
disturbed.  By  his  laws  the  Sunday  continued  to  be  a  day 

*  Justinian,  Cod.,  Lib.  iii.,  Tit.  xii.,  1.  3. 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  351 

in  which  public  business  was  not  to  be  transacted.  But  the 
Christmas  days,  the  fifteen  days  of  Easter,  and  numerous 
other  days  previously  observed  by  Christians  or  pagans, 
were  put  in  the  same  class  by  the  law.  All  this  it  seems 
was  done  from  no  superstitious  notions  respecting  those 
days,  but  for  the  sake  of  public  utility  and  convenience. 
However,  the  rigor  of  the  Jewish  Sabbatical  laws  was  by  no 
means  followed.  Labors  of  love,  opera  caritatis,  were 
considered  as  suitable  business  for  those  days.  The  very 
statute  of  Theodosius  recommended  the  emancipation  of 
slaves  on  Sunday.  All  impediments  to  their  liberation  were 
removed  on  that  day,  and  though  judicial  proceedings  in  all 
other  matters  were  forbidden  on  Sunday,  an  exception  was 
expressly  made  in  favor  of  emancipating  slaves.  This 
statute  was  preserved  in  the  code  of  Justinian.*  All  these 
laws  go  to  show  that  there  were  similar  customs  previously 
established  among  the  Christians,  without  the  aid  of  legisla- 
tion. 

About  the  middle  of  the  sixth  century  the  Council  of 
Orleans  forbade  labor  in  the  fields,  though  it  did  not  forbid 
travelling  with  cattle  and  oxen,  the  preparation  of  food,  or 
any  work  necessary  to  the  cleanliness  of  the  house  or  the 
person  —  declaring  that  rigors  of  that  sort  belong  more  to  a 
Jewish  than  to  a  Christian  observance  of  the  day.  That,  I 
think,  is  the  earliest  ecclesiastical  decree  which  has  come 
down  to  us  forbidding  field-labor  in  the  country ;  a  decree 
unknown  till  five  hundred  and  thirty-eight  years  after 
Christ.  But  before  that,  in  the  year  three  hundred  and 
thirteen,  the  Council  of  Elvira  in  Spain  decreed,  that  if 
any  one  in  a  city  absented  himself  three  Sundays  consecu- 
tively from  the  church,  he  should  be  suspended  from  com- 
munion for  a  short  time.  Such  a  regulation,  however,  was 
founded  purely  on  considerations  of  public  utility.  Many 
church  establishments  have  thought  it  necessary  to  protect 
themselves  from  desertion  by  similar  penal  Jaws. 

*  Cod.,  Lib.  iii.,  Tit.  xii.,  1.  2.    See  also  1.  3  and  11. 


352  THOUGHTS    ON   THE    MOST 

In  Catholic  countries,  at  the  present  day,  the  morning  of 
Sunday  is  appropriated  to  public  worship,  the  people  flock- 
ing to  church.  But  the  afternoon  and  evening  are  devoted 
to  society,  to  amusement  of  various  kinds.  Nothing  appears 
sombre,  but  every  thing  has  a  festive  air  ;  even  the  theatres 
are  open.  Sunday  is  like  Christmas,  or  a  Thanksgiving 
day  in  Boston,  only  the  festive  demonstrations  are  more 
public.  It  is  so  in  the  Protestant  countries  on  the  continent 
of  Europe.  Work  is  suspended,  public  and  private,  except 
what  is  necessary  for  the  observance  of  the  day;  public 
lectures  are  suspended  ;  public  libraries  closed  ;  but  galle- 
ries of  paintings  and  statues  are  thrown  open  and  crowded  ; 
the  public  walks  are  thronged.  In  Southern  Germany,  and, 
doubtless,  elsewhere,  young  men  and  women  have  I  seen  in 
summer,  of  a  Sunday  afternoon,  dancing  on  the  green,  the 
clergyman,  Protestant  or  Catholic,  looking  on  and  enjoying 
the  cheerfulness  of  the  young  people.  Americans  think 
their  mode  of  keeping  Sunday  is  unholy  ;  they,  that  ours  is 
Jewish  and  pharisaical.  In  Paris,  sometimes,  courses  of 
scientific  lectures  are  delivered  after  the  hours  of  religious 
services,  to  men  who  are  busy  during  the  week  with  other 
cares,  and  who  gladly  take  the  hours  of  their  only  leisure 
day  to  gain  a  little  intellectual  instruction. 

When  England  was  a  Catholic  country,  Catholic  notions 
of  Sunday  of  course  prevailed.  Labor  was  suspended ; 
there  was  service  in  the  churches,  and  afterwards  there 
were  sports  for  the  people,  but  they  were  attended  with 
quarrelling,  noise,  uproar,  and  continual  drunkenness.  It 
was  so  after  the  Reformation.  In  the  time  of  Elizabeth,  the 
laws  forbade  labor  except  in  time  of  harvest,  when  it  was 
thought  right  to  work,  if  need  were,  and  "  save  the  thing 
that  God  hath  sent."  Some  of  the  Protestants  wished  to 
reform  those  disorders,  and  convert  the  Sunday  to  a  higher 
use.  The  government,  and  sometimes  the  superior  clergy, 
for  a  long  time -interfered  to  prevent  the  reform,  often  to 
protect  the  abuse.  The  "  Book  of  Sports,"  appointed  to  be 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  353 

read  in  churches,  is  well  known  to  us  from  the  just  indigna- 
tion with  which  it  filled  our  fathers. 

Now,  it  is  plain,  that  in  England,  before  the  Reforma- 
tion, the  Sunday  was  not  appropriated  to  its  highest  use  ;  not 
to  the  highest  interests  of  mankind  ;  no,  not  to  the  highest 
concerns,  which  the  people,  at  that  time,  were  capable  of 
appreciating.  The  attempts,  made  then  and  subsequently, 
by  government,  to  enforce  the  observance  of  the  day, 
for  purposes  not  the  highest,  led  to  a  fearful  reaction  ;  that 
to  other  and  counter  reactions.  The  ill  consequences  of 
those  movements  have  not  yet  ceased  on  either  side  of  the 
ocean. 

v  The  Puritans  represented  the  spirit  of  reaction  against 
ecclesiastical  and  other  abuses  of  their  time,  and  the  age 
before  them.  Let  me  do  these  men  no  injustice.  I  honor 
the  heroic  virtues  of  our  fathers  not  less  because  I  see  their 
faults  ;  see  the  cause  of  their  faults,  and  the  occasion  which 
demanded  such  masculine  and  terrible  virtues  as  the  Puritans 
unquestionably  possessed.  I  speak  only  of  their  doctrine  of 
the  Sunday.*  They  were  driven  from  one  extreme  to  the 
other,  for  oppression  makes  wise  men  mad.  They  took 
mainly  the  notions  of  the  Sabbath,  which  belong  to  the  later 
portions  of  the  Old  Testament ;  they  interpreted  them  with 
the  most  pharisaical  rigor,  and  then  applied  them  to  the 
Sunday.  Did  they  find  no  warrant  for  that  rigor  in  the 
New  Testament  ?  they  found  enough  in  the  Old  ;  enough 
in  their  own  character,  and  their  consequent  notions  of  God. 
They  thus  introduced  a  set  of  ideas  respecting  the  Sunday, 
which  the  Christian  church  had  never  known  before,  and 
rigidly  enforced  an  observance  thereof  utterly  foreign  both 
to  the  letter  and  spirit  of  the  New  Testament.  They  made 
Sunday  a  terrible  day  ;  a  day  of  fear,  and  of  fasting,  and 
of  trembling  under  the  terrors  of  the  Lord.  They  even 
called  it  by  the  Hebrew  name  —  the  Sabbath.  The  Catho- 
lics had  said  it  was  not  safe  to  trust  the  Scriptures  in  the 
hands  of  the  people,  for  an  inspired  Word  needed  an  expos- 
30* 


354  THOUGHTS    ON   THE    MOST 

itor  also  inspired.  The  abuse  which  the  Puritans  made  of 
the  Bible  by  their  notions  of  the  Sunday,  seemed  a  fulfil- 
ment of  the  Catholic  prophecy.  But  the  Catholics  did  not 
see  what  is  plain  to  all  men  now  —  that  this  very  abuse  of 
Sunday  and  Scripture  was  only  the  reaction  against  other 
abuses,  ancient,  venerated,  and  enforced  by  the  Catholic 
church  itself. 

Every  sect  has  some  institution  which  is  the  symbol  of  its 
religious  consciousness,  though  not  devised  for  that  purpose. 
With  the  early  Christians,  it  was  their  love-feasts  and  com- 
munion ;  with  the  Catholics,  it  is  their  gorgeous  ritual  with 
its  ancient  date  and  divine  pretensions  —  a  ritual  so  impos- 
ing to  many  ;  with  the  Quakers,  who  scorn  all  that  is  sym- 
bolic, the  symbol  equally  appears  in  the  plain  dress  and  the 
plain  speech,  the  broad  brim,  and  thee  and  thou.  With  the 
Puritans,  this  symbol  was  the  Sabbath,  not  the  Sunday. 
Their  Sabbath  was  like  themselves,  austere,  inflexible 
as  their  "  divine  decrees ; "  not  human  and  of  man,  but 
Hebrew  and  of  the  Jews,  stern,  cold,  and  sad. 

The  Puritans  were  possessed  with  the  sentiment  of  fear 
before  God  ;  they  had  ideas  analogous  to  that  sentiment, 
and  wrought  out  actions  akin  to  those  ideas.  They  brought 
to  America  their  ideas  and  sentiments.  Behold  the  effect 
of  their  actions.  Let  us  walk  reverently  backward,  with 
averted  eyes  to  cover  up  their  folly,  their  shame,  and  their 
sin,  as  they  could  not  walk  to  conceal  the  folly  of  their  pro- 
genitors. The  Puritans  are  the  fathers  of  New  England 
and  her  descendant  States ;  the  fathers  of  the  American 
idea  ;  of  most  things  in  America  that  are  good  ;  surely,  of 
most  that  is  best.  They  seem  made  on  purpose  for  their 
work  of  conquering  a  wilderness  and  founding  a  State.  It 
is  not  with  gentle  hands,  not  with  the  dalliance  of  effemi- 
nate fingers,  that  such  a  task  is  done.  The  work  required 
energy  the  most  masculine,  in  heart,  head,  and  hands. 
None  but  the  Puritans  could  have  done  such  a  work.  They 
could  fast  as  no  men ;  none  could  work  like  them ;  none 


CHRISTIAN   USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  355 

preach  ;  none  pray  ;  none  could  fight  as  they  fought.  They 
have  left  a  most  precious  inheritance  to  men  who  have  the 
same  greatness  of  soul,  but  have  fallen  on  happier  times. 
Yet  this  inheritance  is  fatal  to  mere  imitators,  who  will  go 
on  planting  of  vineyards,  where  the  first  planter  fell  intoxi- 
cated with  the  fruit  of  his  own  toil.  This  inheritance  is 
dangerous  to  men  who  will  be  no  wiser  than  their  ancestors. 
Let  us  honor  the  good  deeds  of  our  fathers  ;  and  not  eat, 
but  reverently  bury  their  honored  bones. 

The  Puritans  represented  the  natural  reaction  of  mankind 
against  old  institutions  that  were  absurd  or  tyrannical.  The 
Catholic  church  had  multiplied  feast  days  to  an  extreme,  and 
taken  unnecessary  pains  to  promote  fun  and  frolic.  The 
Puritans  would  have  none  of  the  saints'  days  in  their 
calendar ;  thought  sport  was  wicked  ;  cut  down  Maypoles, 
and  punished  a  man  who  kept  Christmas  after  the  old 
fashion.  The  Catholic  church  had  neglected  her  golden 
opportunities  for  giving  the  people  moral  and  religious 
instruction  ;  had  quite  too  much  neglected  public  prayer  and 
preaching,  but  relied  mainly  on  sensuous  instruments  — 
'architecture,  painting,  music.  In  revenge,  the  Puritan  had 
a  meeting-house  as  plain  as  boards  could  make  it  ;  tore  the 
pictures  to  pieces  ;  thought  an  organ  "  was  not  of  God," 
and  had  sermons  long  and  numerous,  and  prayers  full  of 
earnestness,  zeal,  piety,  and  faith,  in  short,  possessed  of  all 
desirable  things  except  an  end.  Did  the  Catholics  forbid 
the  people  the  Bible,  emphatically  the  book  of  the  people  — 
the  Puritan  would  read  no  other  book ;  called  his  children 
Hebrew  names,  and  re-enacted  "the  laws  of  God"  in  the 
Old  Testament,  "  until  we  can  make  better."  Did  Henry 
and  Elizabeth  underrate  the  people  and  overvalue  the 
monarchy,  nature  had  her  vengeance  for  that  abuse,  and  the 
Puritan  taught  the  world  that  kings,  also,  had  a  joint  in  their 
necks. 

The  Puritans  went  to  the  extreme  in  many  things  :  in 
their  contempt  for  amusements,  for  what  was  graceful  in 


356  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

man  or  beautiful  in  woman  ;  in  their  scorn  of  art,  of  elegant 
literature,  even  of  music  ;  in  their  general  condemnation  of 
the  past,  from  which  they  would  preserve  little  excepting 
what  was  Hebrew,  that,  of  course,  they  over-honored  as 
much  as  they  undervalued  all  the  rest.  In  their  notions 
respecting  the  Sunday  they  went  to  the  same  extreme.  The 
general  reason  is  obvious.  They  wished  to  avoid  old  abuses, 
and  thought  they  were  not  out  of  the  water  till  they  were  in 
the  fire.  But  there  was  a  special  reason,  also  :  the  English 
are  the  most  empirical  of  all  nations.  They  love  a  fact 
more  than  an  idea,  and  often  cling  to  an  historical  precedent 
rather  than  obey  a  great  truth  which  transcends  all  pre- 
cedents. The  national  tendency  to  external  things,  perhaps, 
helped  lead  them  to  these  peculiar  notions  of  the  Sabbath. 
The  precedent  they  found  in  "  The  chosen  people,"  and 
established,  as  they  thought,  by  God  himself. 

The  ideas  of  the  Puritans  respecting  the  Sunday  are  still 
cherished  in  the  popular  theology  of  New  England.  .  There 
is  one  party  in  our  churches  possessed  of  many  excellences, 
which  has  always  had  the  merit  of  speaking  out  fully  what' 
it  thinks  and  feels.  At  this  day  that  party  still  represents 
the  Puritanic  opinions  about  the  Sunday,  though  a  little 
modified.  They  teach  that  God  created  the  world  in  six 
days,  and  rested  the  seventh  ;  that  he  commanded  mankind, 
also,  to  rest  on  that  day  ;  commanded  a  man  to  be  stoned  to 
death  for  picking  up  sticks  of  a  Saturday ;  that  by  divine 
authority  the  first  day  of  the  week  was  substituted  for  the 
seventh,  and  therefore  that  it  is  the  religious  duty  of  all  men 
to  rest  from  work  on  that  day,  for  the  Hebrew  law  of  the 
Sabbath  is  binding  on  Christians  for  ever.  It  is  maintained 
that  abstinence  from  work  on  Sunday  is  as  much  a  religious 
duty  as  abstinence. from  theft  or  hatred  ;  that  the  day  must 
be  exclusively  devoted  to  religion,  in  the  technical  sense  of 
that  word,  to  public  or  private  worship,  to  religious  reading, 
thought,  or  conversation.  To  attend  church  on  that  day  is 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  357 

thought  to  be  a  good  in  itself,  though  it  should  lead  to  no 
further  good,  and  therefore  a  duty  as  imperative  as  the  duty 
of  loving  man  and  God.  The  preacher  may  not  edify,  still 
the  duty  of  attending  to  his  ministration  of  the  word  remains 
the  same  ;  for  the  attendance  is  a  good  in  itself.  It  is  taught 
that  work,  that  amusement,  common  conversation,  the  read- 
ing of  a  book  not  technically  religious,  is  a  sin,  just  as 
clearly  a  sin  as  theft  or  hatred,  though  perhaps  not  so  great. 
Writing  a  letter,  even,  is  denounced  as  a  sin,  though  the 
letter  be  written  for  the  purpose  of  arresting  the  progress  of 
a  war,  and  securing  life  and  freedom  to  millions  of  men. 

Now,  it  is  very  plain  that  such  ideas  are  not  consistent 
with  the  truth.  In  the  language  of  the  church,  they  are  a 
heresy.  As  we  learn  the  facts  of  the  case  we  must  give  up 
such  ideas  concerning  the  Sunday.  It  is  like  any  other  day. 
Christianity  knows  no  classes  of  days,  as  holy  or  profane ; 
all  days  are  the  Lord's  days,  all  time  holy  time. 

But  then  comes  the  other  question,  What  is  the  best  use 
to  be  made  of  the  day  ;  the  use  most  conductive  to  the 
highest  interests  of  mankind  ?  Will  it  be  most  profitable  to 
"  give  up  the  Sunday,"  to  use  it  as  the  Catholics  do,  as  the 
Puritans  did,  or  to  adopt  some  other  method  ?  To  answer 
these  questions  fairly,  let  us  look  and  see  the  effects  of  the 
present  notions  about  the  Sunday,  and  the  stricter  mode  of 
observing  it  here  in  New  England.  The  experience  of  two 
hundred  years  is  worth  looking  at.  Let  us  look  at  the  good 
effects  first. 

The  good  and  evil  of  any  age  are  commonly  bound  so 
closely  together,  that  in  plucking  up  the  tares,  there  is 
danger  lest  the  wheat  also  be  uprooted,  at  least  trodden 
down.  In  America,  especially  in  New  England,  every 
thing  is  intense,  with  of  course  a  tendency  to  extravagance, 
to  fanaticism.  Look  at  some  of  the  most  obvious  signs  of 
that  intensity.  No  conservatism  in  the  world  is  so  bigoted 
as  American  conservatism  ;  no  democracy  so  intense.  No- 


358  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

where  else  can  you  find  such  thorough-going  defenders  of 
the  existing  state  of  things,  social,  ecclesiastical,  civil ; 
such  defenders  of  drunkenness,  ignorance,  superstition, 
slavery,  and  war ;  nowhere  such  radical  enemies  to  the 
existing  state  of  things  ;  such  foes  of  drunkenness,  igno- 
rance, superstition,  slavery,  and  war.  No  "  Revivals  of 
religion"  are  like  the  American  ;  none  of  old  were  like 
these.  See  how  the  American  soldiers  fight ;  how  the 
American  men  will  work.  Puritanism  was  intense  enough 
in  England  ;  in  the  New  World  it  was  yet  more  so.  Our 
fathers  were  intense  Calvinists  ;  more  Calvinistic  than  Cal- 
vin —  they  became  Hopkinsian.  They  hated  the  Pope  ; 
kings  and  bishops  were  their  aversion.  They  feared  God. 
Did  they  love  him  —  love  him  as  much  ?  They  had  an 
intense  religious  activity,  but  they  had  another  intensity.  It 
is  better  that  we  should  say  it,  rather  than  men  who  do  not 
honor  them.  That  intensity  of  action,  when  turned  towards 
material  things,  or,  as  they  called  them,  "  carnal  things," 
needed  some  powerful  check.  It  was  found  in  their  bigotry 
and  superstition.  In  such  an  age  as  theirs,  when  the  Re- 
formation broke  down  all  the  ordinary  restraints  of  society, 
and  rent  asunder  the  golden  ties  which  bound  man  to  the 
past ;  when  the  Anglican  church  ended  in  fire,  and  the 
English  monarchy  in  blood  ;  when  men  full  of  piety  thank- 
ed God  for  the  fire  and  the  bloodshed,  and  felt  the  wrongs 
of  a  thousand  years  driving  them  almost  to  madness  — 
what  was  there  to  keep  such  men  within  bounds,  and  re- 
strain them  from  the  wildest  license  and  unbridled  anarchy  ? 
Nothing  but  superstition  ;  nothing  short  of  fear  of  hell. 
They  broke  down  the  monarchy  ;  they  trod  the  church 
under  their  feet.  She  who  had  once  been  counted  as  the 
queen  and  mother  of  society,  was  now  to  be  regarded  only 
as  the  Apocalyptical  woman  in  scarlet,  the  mother  of  abom- 
inations, bride  of  the  devil,  and  queen  of  hell.  The  Old 
Testament  wrought  on  the  minds  of  these  men  like  a  charm, 
to  stimulate  and  to  soothe.  "  One  day,"  said  they,  "  is 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  359 

made  holy  by  God  ;  in  it  shall  no  work  be  done  by  man  or 
beast,  or  thing  inanimate.  On  that  day  all  must  attend 
church  as  an  act  of  religion."  Here,  then,  was  a  bar  ex- 
tending across  the  stream  of  worldliness,  filling  one  seventh 
part  of  its  channel,  wide  and  deep,  and  wonderfully  inter- 
rupting its  whelming  tide.  I  admire  the  divine  skill  which 
compounds  the  gases  in  the  air  ;  which  balances  centripetal 
and  centrifugal  forces  into  harmonious  proportions,  —  those 
fair  ellipses  in  the  unseen  air ;  but  still  more  marvellous  is 
that  same  skill,  diviner  now,  which  compounds  the  folly  and 
the  wisdom  of  mankind  ;  balances  centripetal  and  centri- 
fugal forces  here,  stilling  the  noise  of  kings  and  the  tumult 
of  the  people,  making  their  wrath  to  serve  him,  and  the 
remnant  thereof  restraining  for  ever. 

On  Sunday,  master  and  man,  the  slave  stolen  from  the 
wilderness,  the  servant  —  a  Christian  man  bought  from  some 
Christian  conqueror,  —  must  cease  from  their  work.  Did 
the  covetous,  the  cruel,  the  strong,  oppress  the  weak  for  six 
days,  the  Sabbath  said,  "  Hitherto  shalt  thou  come,  but  no 
further."  The  servant  was  free  from  his  master,  and  the 
weary  was  at  rest.  The  plough  stood  still  in  the  furrow  ; 
the  sheaf  lay  neglected  in  the  field  ;  the  horse  and  the  ox 
enjoyed  their  master's  Sabbath  of  rest,  all  heedless  of  the 
divine  decrees,  of  election  or  reprobation,  yet  not  the  less 
watched  over  by  that  dear  Providence  which  numbered  the 
hairs  of  the  head,  and  overruled  the  falling  of  a  sparrow  for 
the  sparrow's  good.  All  must  attend  church,  master  and 
man,  rich  and  poor,  oppressor  and  oppressed.  Good  things 
and  great  things  got  read  out  of  the  Bible,  it  was  the  book  of 
the  people,  the  New  Testament,  written  much  of  it  in  the 
interest  of  all  mankind,  with  special  emphasis  laid  on  the 
rights  of  the  weak  and  the  duties  of  the  strong.  Good  things 
got  said  in  sermon  and  in  prayer.  The  speakers  must  think, 
the  hearers  think,  as  well  as  tremble.  Begin  to  think  in  a 
circle  narrow  as  a  lady's  ring,  or  the  Assembly's  Catechism, 
you  will  think  out ;  for  thought,  like  all  movement,  tends  to 


360  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

the  right  line.  Calvinism  has  always  bred  thinkers,  and 
when  barbarism  was  the  first  danger  was  perhaps  the  only 
thing  which  could  do  it.  Calvinism,  too,  has  always  shown 
itself  in  favor  of  popular  liberty  to  a  certain  degree,  and 
though  it  stops  far  short  of  the  mark,  yet  goes  far  beyond 
the  Catholic  or  Episcopalian. 

Sunday,  thus  enforced  by  superstition,  has  yet  been  the 
education-day  of  New  England  ;  the  national  school-time 
for  the  culture  of  man's  highest  powers  ;  therein  have  the 
clergy  been  our  educators,  and  done  a  vast  service  which 
mankind  will  not  soon  forget.  It  was  good  seed  they  sowed 
on  this  soil  of  the  New  World  ;  the  harvest  is  proof  of  that. 
They  builded  wiser  than  they  knew.  Their  unconscious 
hands  constructed  the  thought  of  God.  Even  their  supersti- 
.  tion  and  bigotry  did  much  to  preserve  church  and  clergy  to 
-  "us ;  much  also  to  educate  and  develop  the  highest  powers 
of  man.  But  for  that  superstition  we  might  have  seen  the 
same  anarchy,  the  same  unbridled  license  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  which  we  saw  in  the  eighteenth,  as  a  consequence 
of  a  similar  revolution,  a  similar  reaction ;  only  it  would 
have  been  carried  out  with  the  intensity  of  that  most  mascu- 
line and  earnest  race  of  men.  How  much  further  English 
atrocities  would  have  gone  than  the  French  did  go  ;  how 
long  it  would  have  taken  mankind,  by  their  proper  motion, 
to  reascend  from  a  fall  so  adverse  and  so  low,  I  cannot  tell. 
I  see  what  saved  them  from  the  plunge. 

True,  the  Sunday  was  not  what  it  should  be,  more  than 
the  week ;  preaching  was  not  what  it  should  be,  more  than 
practice.  But  without  that  Sunday,  and  without  that  preach- 
ing, New  England  would  have  been  a  quite  different  land ; 
America  another  nation  altogether ;  the  world  by  no  means 
so  far  advanced  as  now.  New  England  with  her  descend- 
ants has  always  been  the  superior  portion  of  America.  I 
flatter  no  man's  prejudice,  but  speak  a  plain  truth.  She  is 
superior  in  intelligence,  in  morality  —  that  is  too  plain  for 
proof.  The  prime  cause  of  that  superiority  must  be  sought 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  361 

in  the  character  of  the  fathers  of  New  England ;  but  a 
secondary  and  most  powerful  cause  is  to  be  found  also  in 
those  two  institutions  —  Sunday  and  preaching.  Why  is  it 
that  all  great  movements,  from  the  American  Revolution 
down  to  anti-slavery,  have  begun  here  ?  Why  is  it  that 
education  societies,  missionary  societies,  Bible  societies,  and 
all  the  movements  for  the  advance  of  mankind,  begin  here  ? 
Why,  it  is  no  more  an  accident  than  the  rising  of  the  tide. 
Find  much  of  the  cause  in  the  superior  character,  and 
therefore  in  the'  superior  aims  of  the  forefathers,  much  also 
will  be  found  due  to  this  —  Once  in  the  week  they  paused 
from  all  work  ;  they  thought  of  their  God,  who  had  deliv- 
ered them  from  the  iron  house  and  yoke  of  bondage  ;  they 
listened  to  the  words  of  able  men,  exhorting  them  to  justice, 
piety,  and  a  heavenly  walk  with  God  ;  they  trembled  at  fear 
of  hell ;  they  rejoiced  at  hope  of  heaven.  The  church  — " 
no,  the  "meeting-house"  —  was  the  common  property  of 
all ;  the  minister  the  common  friend.  The  slave  looked  up 
to  him  ;  the  chief  magistrate  dared  not  look  down  on  him. 
For  more  than  a  hundred  years  the  ablest  men  of  New 
England  went  into  the  pulpit.  No  talent  was  thought  too 
great,  no  learning  too  rich  and  profound,  no  genius  too  holy 
and  divine,  for  the  work  of  teaching  men  their  highest  duty, 
and  helping  to  their  highest  bliss.  He  was  the  minister  to 
all.  There  was  not  then  a  church  for  the  rich,  and  a  chapel 
for  the  poor ;  the  rich  and  the  poor  met  together,  for  one 
God  was  the  maker  of  them  all  —  their  Father  too  ;  they 
had  one  Gospel,  one  Redeemer,  —  their  Brother  not  less 
than  their  God  ;  they  journeyed  toward  the  same  heaven, 
which  had  but  one  entrance  for  great  and  little  ;  they  prayed 
all  the  same  prayer.  The  effect  of  this  socialism  of  religion 
is  seldom  noticed  ;  so  we  walk  on  moist  earth,  not  thinking 
that  we  tread  on  the  thunder-cloud  and  the  lightning.  But  it 
is  not  in  human  nature  for  men  of  intense  religious  activity 
to  meet  in  the  same  church,  sing  the  same  psalm,  pray  the 
same  prayer,  partake  the  same  elements  of  communion, 
31 


362  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

and  not  be  touched  with  compassion  —  each  for  all,  and  all 
for  each.  The  same  causes  which  built  up  religion  in  New 
England,  built  up  democracy  along  with  it.  Is  it  not  easy 
'  to  see  the  cause  which  made  the  rich  men  of  New  England 
the  most  benevolent  of  rich  men  ;  gave  them  their  character 
for  generosity  and  public  spirit  —  yes,  for  eminent  human- 
ity ?  The  acorn  is  not  more  obviously  the  parent  of  the  oak 
than  those  two  institutions  of  New  England  the  parent  of 
such  masculine  virtues  as  distinguish  her  sons. 

Regarded  merely  as  a  day  of  rest  from  labor,  the  Sunday 
has  been  of  great  value  to  us.  Considering  the  intense 
character  of  the  nation,  our  tendency  to  material  things,  and 
our  restless  love  of  work,  it  seems  as  if  a  Moses  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  legislating  for  us,  would  enact  two  rest-days 
in  the  week,  rather  than  one.  It  is  a  good  thing  that  a  man 
once  a  week  pauses  from  his  work,  arrays  himself  in  clean 
garments,  and  is  at  rest. 

Regarded  in  its  other  aspects,  Sunday  has  aided  the  in- 
tellectual culture  of  the  people  to  a  degree  not  often  appre- 
ciated. To  many  a  man,  yes,  to  most  men,  it  is  their  only 
reading  day,  and  they  will  read  "  secular "  books,  spite  of 
the  clerical  admonition.  Many  a  poor  boy  in  New  England, 
who  has  toiled  all  the  week,  and  would  gladly  have  studied 
all  the  night,  did  not  obstinate  Nature  forbid,  has  studied 
stealthily  all  Sunday,  not  Jeremiah  and  the  prophets,  but 
Homer  and  the  mathematics,  and  risen  at  length  to  eminence 
amongst  cultivated  men  ;  —  he  has  to  thank  the  Sunday  for 
the  beginnings  of  that  manly  growth. 

The  moral  and  religious  effect  of  the  day  is  yet  more 
important.  One  seventh  part  of  the  time  was  to  be  devoted 
to  moral  and  religious  culture.  The  clergy  watched  dili- 
gently over  Sunday,  as  their  own  day.  Work  was  then  the 
accident ;  religion  was  the  business.  Every  thing  with  us 
becomes  earnest ;  Sunday  as  earnest  as  the  week.  It  must 
not  be  spent  idly.  Perhaps  no  body  of  clergymen,  for  two 
hundred  years,  on  the  whole,  were  ever  so  wakeful  and 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  363 

active  as  the  American.  They  also  are  earnest  and  full  of 
intensity,  especially  in  the  more  serious  sects.  I  think  lam 
not  very  superstitious  ;  not  often  inclined  to  lean  on  my 
father's  staff  rather  than  walk  on  my  own  feet ;  not  over-much 
accustomed  to  take  things  on  trust  because  they  have  been 
trusted  to  all  along :  but  I  must  confess  that  I  see  a  vast 
amount  of  good  achieved  by  the  aid  of  these  two  institutions, 
the  Sunday  and  preaching,  which  could  not  have  been  done 
without  them.  I  know  I  have  my  prejudices;  I  love  the 
Sunday  ;  a  professional  bias  may  warp  me  aside,  for  I  am  a 
preacher  —  the  pulpit  is  my  joy  and  my  throne.  Judge  you 
how  far  my  profession  and  my  prejudice  have  led  me  astray 
in  estimating  the  value  of  the  Sunday,  its  preaching,  and 
the  good  they  have  achieved  for  us  in  New  England.  I 
know  what  superstition,  what  bigotry,  has  been  connected 
with  both  ;  I  know  it  has  kept  grim  and  terrible  guard  about 
these  institutions.  I  look  upon  that  superstition  and  bigotry, 
as  on  the  old  New  England  guns  which  were  fought  with  in 
the  Indian  wars,  the  French  wars,  and  the  Revolution  ;  — 
things  that  did  service  when  men  knew  not  how  to  defend 
what  they  valued  most  with  better  tools  and  more  Christian. 
I  look  on  both  with  the  same  melancholy  veneration,  but 
honor  them  the  more  that  now  they  are  old,  battered,  unfit 
for  use  and  covered  with  rust.  I  would  respectfully  hang 
them  up,  superstition  and  the  musket,  side  by  side  ;  honor- 
able, but  harmless,  with  their  muzzles  down,  and  pray  God 
it  might  never  be  my  lot  to  handle  such  ungodly  weapons, 
though  in  a  cause  never  so  humane  and  holy. 

Let  us  look  a  little  at  the  ill  effects  of  these  notions  of  the 
Sunday  and  the  observance  which  they  led  to.  It  is  thought 
an  act  of  religion  to  attend  church  and  give  a  mere  bodily 
presence  there.  Hence  the  minister  often  relies  on  this  cir- 
cumstance to  bring  his  audience  together  ;  preaches  sermons 
on  the  duty  of  going  to  church,  while  ingenuous  boys  blush 
for  his  weakness,  and  ask,  "Wore  it  not  better  to  rely  on 


364  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

your  goodness,  your  piety,  your  wisdom  ;  on  your  superior 
ability  to  teach  men,  even  on  your  eloquence,  rather  than 
tell  them  it  is  an  act  of  religion  to  come  and  hear  you, 
when  both  they  and  you  are  painfully  conscious  that  they 
are  thereby  made  no  wiser,  no  better,  nor  more  Christian  ?  " 
This  notion  is  a  dangerous  one  for  a  clergyman.  It  flatters 
his  pride  and  encourages  his  sloth.  It  blinds  him  to  his  own 
defects,  and  leads  him  to  attribute  his  empty  benches  to  the 
perverseness  of  human  nature  and  the  carnal  heart,  which 
a  few  snow-flakes  can  frighten  from  his  church,  while  a 
storm  will  not  keep  them  from  a  lecture  on  science  or  litera- 
ture. No  doubt  it  is  a  man's  duty  to  seek  all  opportunities 
of  becoming  wiser  and  better.  So  far  as  church-going  helps 
that  work,  so  far  it  is  a  duty.  But  to  count  it  in  itself, 
irrespective  of  its  consequences,  an  act  of  religion,  is  to 
commit  a  dangerous  error,  which  has  proved  fatal  to  many 
a  man's  growth  in  goodness  and  piety.  Let  us  look  to  the 
end,  not  merely  at  the  means. 

This  notion  has  also  a  bad  effect  on  the  hearers.  It  is 
thought  an  act  of  religion  to  attend  church,  whether  you 
are  edified  or  not  by  sermon,  by  psalm,  or  prayer  ;  an 
act  of  religion,  though  you  could  more  profitably  spend  the 
time  in  your  own  closet  at  home,  or  with  your  own  thoughts 
in  the  fields.  Of  course,  then,  he  who  attends  once  a  day 
is  thought  a  Christian  to  a  certain  degree ;  if  twice,  more 
so  ;  if  thrice,  why  that  denotes  an  additional  amount  of 
growth  in  grace.  In  this  way  the  day  is  often  spent  in  a 
continual  round  of  meetings.  Sermon  follows  sermon  ; 
prayer  treads  upon  the  footsteps  of  prayer  ;  psalm  effaces 
psalm,  till  morning,  afternoon,  evening,  all  are  gone.  The 
Sunday  is  ended  and  over  ;  the  man  is  tired —  but  has  he  been 
profited  and  made  better  thereby  ?  The  sermons  and  the 
prayers  have  cancelled  one  another,  been  heard  and  forgot. 
They  were  too  numerous  to  remember  or  produce  their 
effect.  So  on  a  summer's  lake,  as  the  winds  loiter  and  then 
pass  by,  ripple  follows  ripple,  and  wave  succeeds  to  wave, 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  365 

yet  the  next  day  the  wind  has  ceased  and  the  unstable  water 
bears  no  trace  left  there  by  all  the  blowings  of  the  former 
day,  but  bares  its  incontinent  bosom  to  the  frailest  and  most 
fleeting  clouds. 

Another  ill  effect  follows  from  regarding  attendance  at 
church  as  an  act  of  religion  in  itself:  —  It  is  forgotten  that 
a  man  cannot  teach  what  he  does  not  know.  If  you  have 
more  manhood  than  I,  more  religion  ;  if  you  are  the  more 
humane  and  the  more  divine,  it  is  idle  for  me  to  try  and 
teach  you  divinity  and  humanity ;  idle  in  you  to  make  be- 
lieve you  are  taught.  The  less  must  learn  of  the  greater, 
not  the  greater  directly  of  the  less.  It  is  too  often  forgotten 
by  the  preacher  that  his  hearers  may  be  capable  of  teaching 
him  ;  that  he  cannot  fill  them  out  of  an  emptiness,  but  a 
fullness.  Hence,  it  comes  to  pass  that  no  one,  how  advanced 
soever,  is  allowed  to  graduate,  so  to  say,  from  the  church. 
Perhaps  it  may  do  a  great  man,  mature  in  Christianity,  good 
to  sit  down  with  his  fellows  and  hear  a  little  man  talk  who 
knows  nothing  of  religion ;  it  may  increase  his  sympathy 
with  mankind.  It  can  hardly  be  an  act  of  religion  to  such 
a  man  so  advanced  in  his  goodness  and  piety  ;  perhaps  not 
the  best  use  he  could  make  of  the  hour. 

The  current  opinion  hinders  social  tendencies.  A  man 
must  not  meet  with  friend  and  neighbor,  or  if  he  does,  he 
must  talk  with  bated  breath,  with  ghostly  countenance,  and 
of  a  ghostly  theme.  From  this  abuse  of  the  Sunday  comes 
much  of  the  cold  and  unsocial  character  which  strangers 
charge  us  with.  As  things  now  go,  there  are  many  who 
have  no  opportunity  for  social  intercourse  except  the  hours 
of  the  Sunday.  Then  it  is  forbidden  them.  So  they  suffer 
and  lose  much  of  the  charm  of  life  ;  become  ungenial,  un- 
social, stiff,  and  hard,  and  cold. 

This  notion  hinders  men,  also,  from  intellectual  culture. 
They  must  read  no   book   but   one  professedly   religious. 
Such  works  are  commonly  poor  and  dull  ;  written  mainly 
by  men  of  little  ability,  of  little  breadth  of  view  ;  not  writ-, 
31* 


366  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

ten  in  the  interest  of  mankind,  but  only  of  a  sect  —  the 
Calvinists  or  Unitarians.  A  good  man  groans  when  he 
looks  over  the  immense  piles  of  sectarian  books  written 
with  good  motives,  and  read  with  the  most  devout  of  inten- 
tions, but  which  produce  their  best  effect  when  they  lead 
only  to  sleep.  Yet  it  is  commonly  taught  that  it  is  religion 
to  spend  a  part  of  Sunday  in  reading  such  works,  in  listen- 
ing, or  in  trying  to  listen,  or  in  affecting  to  try  and  listen,  to 
the  most  watery  sermons,  while  it  is  wicked  to  read  some 
"secular"  book,  philosophy,  history,  poem,  or  tale,  which 
expands  the  mind  and  warms  the  heart.  Our  poor  but  wis- 
dom-seeking boy  must  read  his  Homer  only  by  stealth. 
There  are  many  men  who  have  no  time  for  intellectual 
pursuits,  none  for  reading,  except  on  Sunday.  It  is  cruel  to 
tell  them  they  shall  read  none  but  sectarian  books  or  listen 
only  to  sectarian  words. 

But  there  are  other  evils  yet.  These  notions  and  the 
corresponding  practice  tend  to  make  religion  external,  con- 
sisting in  obedience  to  form,  in  compliance  with  custom  ; 
while  religion  is  and  can  be  only  piety  and  goodness,  love 
to  God  and  love  to  man.  To  keep  the  Sunday  idle,  to  attend 
church,  is  not  being  religious.  It  is  easy  to  do  that ;  easy  to 
stop  there,  and  then  to  look  at  real,  manly  saints,  who  live 
in  the  odor  of  sanctity,  whose  sentiment  is  a  prayer,  their 
deeds  religion,  and  their  whole  life  a  perpetual  communion 
with  God,  and  say,  "  Infidel !  Unbeliever." 

Then,  as  one  day  is  devoted  to  religion,  it  is  thought  that 
is  enough ;  that  religion  has  no  more  business  in  the  world 
than  the  world  in  religion.  So  division  is  made  of  the 
territory  of  mortal  life,  in  which  partition  worldliness  has 
six  days,  while  poor  religion  has  only  the  Sunday,  and  con- 
tent with  her  own  limits,  feels  no  salient  wish  to  absorb  or 
annex  the  week  !  It  is  painful  to  see  this  abuse  of  an  insti- 
tution so  noble.  No  commonness  of  its  occurrence  renders 
it  less  painful.  It  is  painful  to  be  told  that  men  of  the  most 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  367 

scrupulous  sects  on  Sunday,  are  in  the  week  the  least  scru- 
pulous of  men  ! 

But  even  in  religious  matters  it  is  thought  all  things  which 
pertain  directly  to  the  religious  welfare  of  men  are  not 
proper  to  be  discussed  on  Sunday.  One  must  not  preach 
against  intemperance,  against  slavery,  against  war,  on  Sun- 
day. It  is  not  "  evangelical ;  "  not  "  preaching  the  gospel." 
Yet  it  is  thought  proper  to  preach  on  total  depravity,  on 
eternal  damnation  ;  to  show  that  God  will  damn  for  ever  the 
majority  of  mankind ;  that  the  Apostle  Peter  was  a  Unita- 
rian. The  Sunday  is  not  the  time,  the  pulpit  not  the  place, 
preaching  not  the  instrument,  wherewith  to  oppose  the 
monstrous  sins  of  our  day,  and  secure  education,  temperance, 
peace,  freedom,  for  mankind.  It  is  not  evangelical,  not 
Christian,  to  do  that  of  a  Sunday  !  Yet  wonderful  to  say,  it 
is  not  thought  very  wicked  to  hold  a  political  caucus  on 
Sunday  for  the  merest  party  purposes  ;  not  wicked  at  all  to 
work  all  day  at  the  navy-yards  in  fitting  out  vessels,  if  they 
are  only  vessels  of  war ;  not  at  all  wicked  to  toil  all  Sunday, 
if  it  is  only  in  aiming  to  kill  man  in  regular  battle.  Theo- 
logical newspapers  can  expend  their  cheap  censure  on  a 
member  of  Congress  for  writing  a  letter  on  Sunday,  yet 
have  no  word  of  fault  to  find  with  the  order  which  sets 
hundreds  to  work  on  Sunday  in  preparing  armaments  of 
war ;  not  a  word  against  the  war  which  sets  men  to  butcher 
their  Christian  brothers  on  the  day  which  Christians  celebrate 
as  the  anniversary  of  Christ's  triumph  over  death !  These 
things  show  that  we  have  not  yet  arrived  at  the  most  pro- 
fitable and  Christian  mode  of  using  the  Sunday ;  and  when  I 
consider  these  abuses  I  wonder  not  that  the  cry  of  "  Infidel " 
is  met  by  the  unchristian  taunt,  yet  more  deserved  and 
biting,  "  Thou  Hypocrite  !  "  I  wonder  not  that  some  men 
say,  "  Let  us  away  with  the  Sunday  altogether ;  and  if  we 
have  no  place  for  rest,  we  will  have  none  for  hypocrisy." 

The  efforts  honestly  made  by  good  and  honest  men,  to 
Judaize  the  day  still  more  ;  to  revive  the  sterner  features  of 


368  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

ancient  worship  ;  to  put  a  yoke  on  us  which  neither  we  nor 
our  fathers  could  bear ;  to  transform  the  Christian  Sunday 
into  the  Jewish  Sabbath,  must  lead  to  a  reaction.  Abuse  on 
the  one  side  will  be  met  by  abuse  on  the  other ;  despotic 
asceticism  by  license;  Judaism  by  heathenism.  Superstition 
is  the  mother  of  denial.  Men  will  scorn  the  Sunday  ;  abuse 
its  timely  rest.  Its  hours  that  may  be  devoted  to  man's 
highest  interests  will  be  prostituted  to  low  aims,  and  worldli- 
ness  make  an  unbroken  sweep  from  one  end  of  the  month 
to  the  other ;  and  then  it  will  take  years  of  toil  before  man- 
kind can  get  back  and  secure  the  blessings  now  placed 
within  an  easy  reach.  I  put  it  to  you,  men  whose  heads 
time  has  crowned  with  white,  or  sprinkled  with  a  sober  gray, 
if  you  would  deem  it  salutary  to  enforce  on  your  grand- 
children the  Sabbath  austerities  which  your  parents  imposed 
on  you  ?  In  your  youth  was  the  Sunday  a  welcome  day ;  a 
genial  day;  or  only  wearisome  and  sour?  Was  religion, 
dressed  in  her  Sabbath  dress,  a  welcome  guest ;  was  she 
lovely  and  to  be  desired  ?  Your  faces  answer.  Let  us 
profit  by  your  experience. 

How  can  we  make  the  Sunday  yet  more  valuable  ?  If 
we  abandon  the  superstitious  notions  respecting  its  origin 
and  original  design,  the  evils  that  have  hitherto  hindered  its 
use  will  soon  perish  of  themselves.  They  all  grow  out  of 
that  root.  If  men  are  not  driven  into  a  reaction  by  pre- 
tensions for  the  Sunday  which  facts  will  not  warrant;  if 
unreasonable  austerities  are  not  forced  upon  them  in  the 
name  of  the  law,  and  the  name  of  God ;  there  is  no  danger 
in  our  day  that  men  will  abandon  an  institution  which 
already  has  done  so  much  service  to  mankind.  Let  Sunday 
and  preaching  stand  on  their  own  merits,  and  they  will 
encounter  no  more  opposition  than  the  common-school  and 
the  work-days  of  the  week.  Then  men  will  be  ready 
enough  to  appropriate  the  Sunday  to  the  highest  objects  they 
know  and  can  appreciate.  Tell  men  the  Sunday  is  made 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  369 

for  man,  and  they  will  use  it  for  its  highest  use.  Tell  them 
man  is  made  for  it,  and  they  will  war  on  it  as  a  tyrant.  I 
should  be  sorry  to  see  the  Sunday  devoted  to  common  work ; 
sorry  to  hear  the  clatter  of  a  mill,  or  the  rattle  of  the  wheels 
of  business  on  that  day.  I  look  with  pain  on  men  engaged 
needlessly  in  work  on  that  day ;  not  with  the  pain  of  wounded 
superstition,  but  a  deeper  regret.  I  would  not  water  my 
garden  with  perfumes  when  common  water  was  at  hand. 
We  shall  always  have  work  enough  in  America  ;  hand-work, 
and  head-work,  for  common  purposes.  There  is  danger  that 
we  shall  not  have  enough  of  rest,  of  intellectual  cultivation, 
of  refinement,  of  social  intercourse  ;  that  our  time  shall  be 
too  much  devoted  to  the  lower  interests  of  life,  to  the  means 
of  living,  and  not  the  end. 

I  would  not  consider  it  an  act  of  religion  to  attend  church  : 
only  a  good  thing  to  go  there  when  the  way  of  improvement 
leads  through  it ;  when  you  are  made  wiser  and  better  by 
boing  there.  I  am  pained  to  see  a  man  spend  the  whole  of 
a  Sunday  in  going  to  church,  —  and  forgetting  himself  in 
getting  acquainted  with  the  words  of  the  preachers.  I  think 
most  intelligent  hearers,  and  most  intelligent  and  Christian 
preachers,  will  confess  that  two  sermons  are  better  than 
three,  and  one  is  better  than  two.  One  need  only  look  at 
the  afternoon  face  of  a  congregation  in  the  city,  to  be 
satisfied  of  this.  If  one  half  the  day  were  devoted  to  public 
worship,  the  other  half  might  be  free  for  private  studies  of 
men  at  home,  for  private  devotion,  for  social  relaxation, 
for  intercourse  with  one's  own  family  and  friends.  Then 
Sunday  afternoon  and  evening  would  afford  an  excellent 
opportunity  for  meetings  for  the  promotion  of  the  great 
humane  movements  of  the  day,  which  some  would  think  not 
evangelical  enough  to  be  treated  of  in  the  morning.  Would 
it  be  inconsistent  with  the  great  purposes  of  the  day,  incon- 
sistent with  Christianity,  to  have  lectures  on  science,  liter- 
ature, and  similar  subjects  delivered  then  ?  I  do  not  believe 
the  Catholic  custom  of  spending  the  Sunday  afternoon  in 


370  THOUGHTS    ON    THE    MOST 

England,  before  the  Reformation,  was  a  good  one.  It 
diverted  men  from  the  higher  end  to  the  lower.  I  cannot 
think  that  here  and  now  we  need  amusement  so  much  as 
society,  instruction,  refinement,  and  devotion.  Yet  it  seems 
to  rne  unwise  to  restrain  the  innocent  sports  of  children  of 
a  Sunday,  to  the  same  degree  that  our  fathers  did ;  to  make 
Sunday  to  them  a  day  of  gloom  and  sadness.  Thoughtful 
parents  are  now  much  troubled  in  this  matter ;  they  cannot 
enforce  the  old  discipline,  so  disastrous  to  themselves ;  they 
fear  to  trust  their  own  sense  of  what  is  right ;  —  so,  perhaps, 
get  the  ill  of  both  schemes,  and  the  good  of  neither.  There 
are  in  Boston  about  thirty  thousand  Catholics,  twenty-five 
thousand  of  them,  probably,  too  ignorant  to  read  with 
pleasure  or  profit  any  book.  At  home,  amusement  formed 
a  part  of  their  Sunday  service  ;  it  was  a  part  of  their  religion 
to  make  a  festive  use  of  Sunday  afternoon.  What  shall 
they  do?  Is  it  Christian  in  us  by  statute  to  interdict  them 
from  their  recreation  ?  With  the  exception  of  children  and 
these  most  ignorant  persons,  it  does  not  appear  that  there  is 
any  class  amongst  us  who  need  any  part  of  the  Sunday  for 
sport. 

I  am  not  one  of  those  who  wish  "  to  give  up  the  Sunday  ;  " 
indeed  there  are  few  such  men  amongst  us ;  I  would  make 
it  yet  more  useful  and  profitable.  I  would  remove  from  it 
the  superstition  and  the  bigotry  which  have  so  long  been 
connected  with  it ;  I  would  use  it  freely,  as  a  Christian  not 
enslaved  by  the  letter  of  Judaism,  but  made  free  by  an 
obedience  to  the  law  of  the  spirit  of  life.  I  would  use  the 
Sunday  for  religion  in  the  wide  sense  of  that  word  ;  use  it 
to  promote  piety  and  goodness,  for  humanity,  for  science, 
for  letters,  for  society.  I  would  not  abuse  it  by  impudent 
license  on  the  one  hand,  nor  by  slavish  superstition  on  the 
other.  We  can  easily  escape  the  evils  which  come  of  the 
old  abuse ;  can  make  the  Sunday  ten  times  more  valuable 
than  it  is  even  now ;  can  employ  it  for  all  the  highest 
interests  of  mankind,  and  fear  no  reaction  into  libertinism. 


CHRISTIAN    USE    OF    THE    SUNDAY.  371 

The  Sunday  is  made  for  man,  as  are  all  other  days  ;  not 
man  for  the  Sunday.  Let  us  use  it,  then,  not  consuming 
its  hours  in  a  Jewish  observance  ;  not  devote  it  to  the  lower 
necessities  of  life,  but  the  higher ;  not  squander  it  in  idle- 
ness, sloth,  frivolity,  or  sleep  ;  let  us  use  it  for  the  body's 
rest,  for  the  mind's  culture,  for  head  and  heart  and  soul. 

Men  and  women,  you  have  received  the  Sunday  from 
your  fathers,  as  a  day  to  be  devoted  to  the  highest  interests 
of  man.  It  has  done  great  service  for  them  and  for  you. 
But  it  has  come  down  accompanied  with  superstition  which 
robs  it  of  half  its  value.  It  is  easy  for  you  to  make  the  day 
far  more  profitable  to  yourselves  than  it  ever  was  to  your 
fathers  ;  easy  to  divest  it  of  all  bigotry,  to  free  it  from  all 
oldness  of  the  letter  ;  easy  to  leave  it  for  your  children  an 
institution  which  shall  bless  them  for  ages  yet  to  come  :  or 
it  is  easy  to  bind  on  their  necks  unnatural  restraints  ;  to 
impose  on  their  conscience  and  understanding  absurdities 
which  at  last  they  must  repel  with  scorn  and  contempt.  It 
is  in  your  hands  to  make  the  Sunday  Jewish  or  Christian. 


XIII. 

A  SERMON  0V    IMMORTAL  LITE.      PREACHED    AT    THE    MELOUEON,  ON 
SUNDAY,   SEPTEMBER  20,   J846. 


WISDOM    OF    SOLOMON,    III.     1,    4. 

THE    SOCLS    OF    THE   RIGHTEOUS    ARE   IS  THE  HANDS    OF    GOD  :     THK1K   HOPE    IS    FCLL    OF 
IMMORTALITST. 

IT  is  the  belief  of  mankind  that  we  shall  all  live  for  ever. 
This  is  not  a  doctrine  of  Christianity  alone.  It  belongs  to 
the  human  race.  You  may  find  nations  so  rude  that  they 
live  houseless,  in  caverns  of  the  earth ;  nations  that  have  no 
letters,  not  knowing  the  use  of  bows  and  arrows,  fire  or  even 
clothes,  but  no  nation  without  a  belief  in  immortal  life.  The 
form  of  that  belief  is  often  grotesque  and  absurd  ;  the  mode 
of  proof  ridiculous ;  the  expectations  of  what  the  future  life 
is  to  be  are  often  childish  and  silly.  But  notwithstanding  all 
that,  the  fact  still  remains,  the  belief  that  the  soul  of  a  man 
never  dies. 

How  did  mankind  come  by  this  opinion  ?  "  By  a  mira- 
culous revelation,"  says  one.  But  according  to  the  common 
theory  of  miraculous  revelations,  the  race  could  not  have 
obtained  it  in  this  way,  for  according  to  that  theory  the 
heathen  had  no  such  revelations ;  yet  we  find  this  doctrine 
the  settled  belief  of  the  whole  heathen  world.  The  Greeks 
and  Romans  believed  it  long  before  Christ ;  the  Chaldees, 
with  no  pretence  to  miraculous  inspiration,  taught  the  idea 


SERMON    OF    IMMORTAL    LIFE.  373 

of  immortality  ;  while  the  Jews,  spite  of  their  alleged  reve- 
lations, rested  only  in  the  dim  sentiment  thereof. 

It  was  not  arrived  at  by  reasoning.  It  requires  a  good 
deal  of  hard  thinking  to  reason  out  and  prove  this  matter. 
Yet  you  find  this  belief  among  nations  not  capable  as  yet  of 
that  art  of  thinking  and  to  that  degree,  nations  who  never 
tried  to  prove  it,  and  yet  believe  it  as  confidently  as  we. 
The  human  race  did  not  sit  down  and  think  it  out;  never 
waited  till  they  could  prove  it  by  logic  and  metaphysics  ;  did 
not  delay  their  belief  till  a  miraculous  revelation  came  to 
confirm  it.  It  came  to  mankind  by  intuition  ;  by  instinctive 
belief,  the  belief  which  comes  unavoidably  from  the  nature 
of  man.  In  this  same  way  came  the  belief  in  God  ;  the 
love  of  man  ;  the  sentiment  of  justice.  Men  could  see,  and 
knew  they  could  see,  before  they  proved  it ;  before  they  had 
theories  of  vision ;  without  waiting  for  a  miraculous  reve- 
lation to  come  and  tell  them  they  had  eyes,  and  might  see  if 
they  would  look.  Some  faculties  of  the  body  act  spon- 
taneously at  first  —  so  others  of  the  spirit. 

Immortality  is  a  fact  of  man's  nature,  so  it  is  a.  part  of 
the  universe,  just  as  the  sun  is  a  fact  in  the  heavens  and  a 
part  of  the  universe.  Both  are  writings  from  God's  hand  ; 
each  therefore  a  revelation  from  Him,  and  of  Him  ;  only 
not  miraculous,  but  natural,  regular,  normal.  Yet  each  is 
just  as  much  a  revelation  from  Him  as  if  the  great  Soul  of 
all  had  spoken  in  English  speech  to  one  of  us  and  said, 
"There  is  a  sun  there  in  the  heavens,  and  thou  shalt  live 
for  ever."  Yes,  the  fact  is  more  certain  than  such  speech 
would  make  it,  for  this  fact  speaks  always  —  a  perpetual 
revelation,  and  no  words  can  make  it  more  certain. 

As  a  man  attains  consciousness  of  himself,  he  attains 
consciousness  of  his  immortality.  At  first  he  asks  proof  no 
more  of  his  eternal  existence  than  of  his  present  life ; 
instinctively  he  believes  both.  Nay,  he  does  not  separate 
the  two ;  this  life  is  one  link  in  that  golden  and  electric  chain 
of  immortality  ;  the  next  life  another  and  more  bright,  but  in 
32 


374  SEKMON    OF 

the  same  chain.  Immortality  is  what  philosophers  call  an 
ontological  fact ;  it  belongs  essentially  to  the  being  of  man, 
just  as  the  eye  is  a  physiological  fact  and  belongs  to  the 
body  of  man.  To  my  mind  this  is  the  great  proof  of  im- 
mortality:  the  fact  that  it  is  written  in  human  nature  ;  written 
there  so  plain  that  the  rudest  nations  have  not  failed  to  find  it, 
to  know  it ;  written  just  as  much  as  form  is  written  on  the 
circle,  and  extension  on  matter  in  general.  It  comes  to  our 
consciousness  as  naturally  as  the  notions  of  time  and  space. 
We  feel  it  as  a  desire  ;  we  feel  it  as  a  fact.  What  is  thus  in 
man  is  writ  there  of  God  who  writes  no  lies.  To  suppose 
that  this  universal  desire  has  no  corresponding  gratification, 
is  to  represent  Him,  not  as  the  father  of  all  but  as  only  a 
deceiver.  I  feel  the  longing  after  immortality,  a  desire 
essential  to  my  nature,  deep  as  the  foundation  of  my  being ; 
I  find  the  same  desire  in  all  men.  I  feel  conscious  of  im- 
mortality ;  that  I  am  not  to  die ;  no,  never  to  die,  though 
often  to  change.  I  cannot  believe  this  desire  and  conscious- 
ness are  felt  only  to  mislead,  to  beguile,  to  deceive  me.  I 
know  God  is  my  father,  and  the  father  of  the  nations.  Can 
the  Almighty  deceive  his  children  ?  For  my  own  part,  I 
can  conceive  of  nothing  which  shall  make  me  more  certain 
of  my  immortality.  I  ask  no  argument  from  learned  lips. 
No  miracle  could  make  me  more  sure  ;  no,  not  if  the  sheeted 
dead  burst  cerement  and  shroud,  and  rising  forth  from  their 
honored  tombs  stood  here  before  me,  the  disenchanted  dust 
once  more  enchanted  with  that  fiery  life ;  no,  not  if  the  souls 
of  all  my  sires  since  time  began  came  thronging  round,  and 
with  miraculous  speech  told  me  they  lived  and  I  should  also 
live.  I  could  only  say,  "  I  knew  all  this  before,  why  waste 
your  heavenly  speech !  "  I  have  now  indubitable  certainty 
of  eternal  life.  Death  removing  me  to  the  next  state,  can 
give  me  infallible  certainty. 

But  there  are  men  who  doubt  of  immortality.  They  say 
they  are  conscious  of  the  want,  not  of  the  fact.  They  need 
a  proof.  The  exception  here  proves  the  rule.  You  do  not 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  375 

doubt  your  personal  and  conscious  existence  now ;  you  ask 
no  proof  of  that ;  you  would  laugh  at  me  should  I  try  to 
convince  you  that  you  are  alive  and  self-conscious.  Yet 
one  of  the  leaders  of  modern  philosophy  wanted  a  proof  of 
his  as  a  basis  for  his  science,  and  said,  — "  I  am  because  I 
think."  But  his  thought  required  proof  as  much  as  his  being ; 
yes,  logically  more,  for  being  is  the  ground  of  thinking,  not 
thinking  of  being.  At  this  day  there  are  sound  men  who 
deny  the  existence  of  this  outward  world,  declaring  it  only  a 
dream-world.  This  ground,  they  say,  and  yonder  sun  have 
being  but  in  fancy,  like  the  sun  and  ground  you  perchance 
dreamed  of  last  night  whose  being  was  only  a  being-dreamed. 
These  are  exceptional  men,  and  help  prove  the  common 
rule,  that  man  trusts  his  senses  and  believes  an  outward 
world.  Yet  such  are  more  common  amongst  philosophers 
than  men  who  doubt  of  their  immortal  life.  You  cannot 
easily  reason  those  men  out  of  their  philosophy  and  into 
their  senses,  nor  by  your  own  philosophy  perhaps  convince 
them  that  there  is  an  outward  world. 

I  think  few  of  you  came  to  your  belief  in  everlasting  life 
through  reasoning.  Your  belief  grew  out  of  your  general 
state  of  mind  and  heart.  You  could  not  help  it.  Perhaps 
few  of  you  ever  sat  down  and  weighed  the  arguments  for 
and  against  it,  and  so  made  up  your  mind.  Perhaps  those 
who  have  the  firmest  consciousness  of  the  fact  are  least 
familiar  with  the  arguments  which  confirm  that  conscious- 
ness. If  a  man  disbelieves  it,  if  he  denies  it,  his  opinion  is 
not  often  to  be  changed  immediately  or  directly  by  argu- 
ment. His  special  conviction  has  grown  out  of  his  general 
state  of  mind  and  heart,  and  is  only  to  be  removed  by  a 
change  in  his  whole  philosophy.  I  am  not  honoring  men 
for  their  belief,  nor  blaming  men  who  doubt  or  deny.  I  do 
not  believe  any  one  ever  willingly  doubted  this ;  ever 
purposely  reasoned  himself  into  the  denial  thereof.  Men 
doubt  because  they  cannot  help  it;  not  because  they  will, 
but  must. 


376  SERMON    OF 

There  are  a  great  many  things  true  which  no  man  as  yet 
can  prove  true  ;  some  things  so  true  that  nothing  can  make 
them  plainer,  or  more  plainly  true.  I  think  it  is  so  with  this 
doctrine,  and  therefore,  for  myself,  ask  no  argument.  With 
my  views  of  man,  of  God,  of  the  relation  between  the  two, 
I  want  no  proof,  satisfied  with  my  own  consciousness  of 
immortality.  Yet  there  are  arguments  which  are  fair, 
logical,  just,  which  satisfy  the  mind,  and  may,  perhaps,  help 
persuade  some  men  who  doubt,  if  such  men  there  are 
amongst  you.  I  think  that  immortality  is  a  fact  of  con- 
sciousness ;  a  fact  given  in  the  constitution  of  man :  there- 
fore a  matter  of  sentiment.  But  it  requires  thought  to  pick 
it  out  from  amongst  the  other  facts  of  consciousness. 
Though  at  first  merely  a  feeling,  a  matter  of  sentiment,  on 
examination  it  becomes  an  idea  —  a  matter  of  thought.  It 
will  bear  being  looked  at  in  the  sharpest  and  driest  light  of 
logic.  Truth  never  flinches  before  reason.  It  is  so  with 
our  consciousness  of  God  ;  that  is  an  ontological  fact,  a  fact 
given  in  the  nature  of  man.  At  first  it  is  a  feeling,  a  matter 
of  sentiment.  By  thought  we  abstract  this  fact  from  other 
facts  ;  we  find  an  idea  of  God.  That  is  a  matter  of  philoso- 
phy, and  the  analyzing  mind  legitimates  the  idea  and  at 
length  demonstrates  the  existence  of  God,  which  we  first 
learned  without  analysis,  and  by  intuition.  A  great  deal  has 
been  written  to  prove  the  existence  of  God,  and  that  by  the 
ablest  men  ;  yet  I  cannot  believe  that  any  one  was  ever 
reasoned  directly  into  a  belief  in  God,  by  all  those  able 
men,  nor  directly  out  of  it  by  all  the  skeptics  and  scoffers. 
Indirectly  such  works  affect  men,  change  their  philosophy 
and  modes  of  thought,  and  so  help  them  to  one  or  the  other 
conclusion. 

The  idea  of  immortality,  like  the  idea  of  God,  in  a 
certain  sense,  is  born  in  us,  and  fast  as  we  come  to  con- 
sciousness of  ourselves  we  come  to  consciousness  of  God, 
and  of  ourselves  as  immortal.  The  higher  we  advance 
in  wisdom,  goodness,  piety,  the  larger  place  do  God  and 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  377 

immortality  hold  in  our  experience  and  inward  life.  I  think 
that  is  the  regular  and  natural  process  of  a  man's  develop- 
ment. Doubt  of  either  seems  to  me  an  exception,  an 
irregularity.  Causes  that  remove  the  doubt  must  be  general 
more  than  special. 

However,  in  order  to  have  a  basis  of  thought  and  reason- 
ing, as  well  as  of  intuition  and  reason,  let  me  mention  some 
of  the  arguments  for  everlasting  life. 

I.  The  first  is  drawn  from  the  general  belief  of  mankind. 
The  greatest  philosophers  and  the  most  profound  and  per- 
suasive religious  teachers  of  the  whole  world  have  taught 
this.  That  is  an  important  fact,  for  these  men  represent  the 
consciousness  of  mankind  in  the  highest  development  it  has 
yet  reached,  and  in  such  points  are  the  truest  representatives 
of  man.  What  is  more,  the  human  race  believes  it,  not 
merely  as  a  thing  given  by  miraculous  revelation,  not  as  a 
matter  proven  by  science,  not  as  a  thing  of  tradition  resting 
on  some  man's  authority,  but  believes  it  instinctively,  not 
knowing  and  not  asking  why,  or  how  ;  believes  it  as  a  fact 
of  consciousness.  Now  in  a  matter  of  this  sort  the  opinion 
of  the  human  race  is  worth  considering.  I  do  not  value 
very  much  the  opinion  of  a  priesthood  in  Rome,  or  Judea, 
or  elsewhere  on  this  point,  or  any  other,  for  they  may  have 
designs  adverse  to  the  truth.  But  the  general  sentiment  of 
the  human  race  in  a  matter  like  this  is  of  the  greatest 
importance.  This  general  sentiment  of  mankind  is  a  quite 
different  thing  from  public  opinion,  which  favors  freedom  in 
one  country  and  slavery  in  another ;  this  sentiment  of  man- 
kind relates  to  what  is  a  matter  of  feeling  with  most  men. 
It  is  only  a  few  thinkers  that  have  made  it  a  matter  of 
thought.  The  opinion  of  mankind,  so  far  as  we  know,  has 
not  changed  on  this  point  for  four  thousand  years.  Since 
the  dawn  of  history,  man's  belief  in  immortality  has  con- 
tinually been  developing  and  getting  deeper  fixed. 
3-2* 


378  SERMON    OF 

Still  more,  this  belief  is  very  dear  to  mankind.  Let  me 
prove  that.  If  it  were  true  that  one  human  soul  was 
immortal  and  yet  was  to  be  eternally  damned,  getting  only 
more  clotted  with  crime  and  deeper  bit  by  agony  as  the  ages 
went  slowly  by,  then  immortality  were  a  curse,  not  to  that 
man  only,  but  to  all  mankind  —  for  no  amount  of  happiness, 
merited  or  undeserved,  could  ever  atone  or  make  up  for  the 
horrid  wrong  done  to  that  one  most  miserable  man.  Who 
of  you  is  there  that  could  relish  Heaven,  or  even  bear  it  for 
a  moment,  knowing  that  a  brother  was  doomed  to  smart  with 
ever  greatening  agony,  while  year  on  year,  and  age  on  age, 
the  endless  chain  of  eternity  continued  to  coil  round  the 
flying  wheels  of  hell  ?  I  say  the  thought  of  one  such  man 
would  fill  even  Heaven  with  misery,  and  the  best  man  of 
men  would  scorn  the  joys  of  everlasting  bliss,  would  spurn 
at  Heaven  and  say,  "  Give  me  my  brother's  place  ;  for  me 
there  is  no  Heaven  while  he  is  there!"  Now  it  has  been 
popularly  taught,  that  not  one  man  alone,  but  the  vast 
majority  of  all  mankind,  are  thus  to  be  condemned ;  im- 
mortal only  to  be  everlastingly  wretched.  That  is  the 
popular  doctrine  now  in  this  land.  It  has  been  so  taught  in 
the  Christian  churches  these  sixteen  centuries  and  more  — 
taught  in  the  name  of  Christ !  Such  an  immortality  would 
be  a  curse  to  men,  to  every  man ;  as  much  so  to  the 
"  saved"  as  to  the  "  lost ;"  for  who  would  willingly  stay  in 
Heaven,  and  on  such  terms  ?  Surely  not  He  who  wept  with 
weeping  men  !  Yet  in  spite  of  this  vile  doctrine  drawn 
over  the  world  to  come,  mankind  religiously  believes  that 
each  shall  live  for  ever.  This  shows  how  strong  is  the 
instinct  which  can  lift  up  such  a  foul  and  hateful  doctrine 
.  and  still  live  on.  Tell  me  not  that  scoffers  and  critics  shall 
take  away  man's  faith  in  endless  life  :  it  has  stood  a  harder 
test  than  can  ever  come  again. 

II.   The  next  argument  is  drawn  from  the  nature  of  man. 
"1.   All  men  desire  to  be   immortal.     This  desire  is  in- 

'.* 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  379 

stinctive,  natural,  universal.  In  God's  world  such  a  desire 
implies  the  satisfaction  thereof  equally  natural  and  universal. 
It  cannot  be  that  God  has  given  man  this  univeral  desire  of 
immortality,  this  belief  in  it,  and  yet  made  it  all  a  mockery. 
Man  loves  truth  ;  tells  it ;  rests  only  in  it ;  how  much  more 
God  who  is  the  trueness  of  truth.  Bodily  senses  imply  their 
objects  —  the  eye  light,  the  ear  sound  ;  the  touch,  the  taste, 
the  smell,  things  relative  thereto.  Spiritual  senses  like- 
wise foretell  their  object,  —  are  silent  prophecies  of  endless 
life.  The  love  of  justice,  beauty,  truth,  of  man  and  God, 
points  to  realities  unseen  as  yet.  We  are  ever  hungering 
after  noblest  things,  and  what  we  feed  on  makes  us  hunger 
more.  The  senses  are  satisfied,  but  the  soul  never. 

2.  Then,  too,  while  this  composite  body  unavoidably  de- 
cays, this  simple  soul  which  is  my  life  decays  not.     Reason, 
the  affections,  all  the  powers  that  make  the  man,  decay  not. 
True,  the  organs  by  which  they  act  become  impaired.     But 
there  is  no  cause  for  thinking  that  love,  conscience,  reason, 
will,  ever  become  weaker  in  man ;   but  cause  for  thinking 
that  all  these  continually  become  more  strong.     Was  the 
mind  of  Newton  gone  when  his  frame,  long  overtasked, 
refused  its  wonted  work  ? 

3.  Here  on  earth,  every  thing  in  its  place  and  time  ma- 
tures.    The   acorn  and  the  chestnut,  things  natural  to  this 
climate,  ripen  every  year.     A  longer  season  would   make 
them  no  better  nor  bigger.     It  is  so  with  our  body  —  that, 
under  proper  conditions,  becomes  mature.     It  is  so  with  all 
the  things  of  earth.     But   man   is  not  fully  grown  as  the 
acorn  and  the  chestnut ;  never  gets  mature.     Take  the  best 
man  and  the  greatest  —  all  his  faculties  are  not  developed, 
fully  grown  and  matured    .He  is  not  complete  in  the  quali- 
ties of  a  man ;  nay,  often  half  his  qualities  lie  all  unused. 
Shall  we  conclude  these  are  never  to  obtain   development 
and  do  their  work  ?     The  analogy   of  nature  tells  us  that 
man,  the  new-born  plant,  is  but  removed  by  death  to  another 
soil,  where  he  shall  grow  complete  and  become  mature. 


380  SERMON    OF 

4.  Then,  too,  each  other  thing  under  its  proper  conditions 
not  only  ripens  but  is  perfect  also  after  its  kind.     Each 
clover-seed  is  perfect  as  a  star.     Every  lion,  as  a  general 
rule,  is  a  common  representation  of  all  lionhood,  the  ideal  of 
his  race  made  real   in  him,  a  thousand  years  of  life  would 
not  make  him  more.     But  where  is  the  Adamitic  man  ;  the 
type  and  representative  of  his  race,  who  makes  actual  its 
idea  ?     Even  Jesus  bids  you  not  call  him  good  ;  no  man  has 
all  the  manhood  of  mankind.     Yes,  there  are  rudiments  of 
greatness  in  us  all,  but  abortive,  incomplete,  and  stopped  in 
embryo.     Now  all    these   elements  of  manhood    point   as 
directly  to  another  state  as  the  unfinished  walls  of  yonder 
rising  church  intimate  that  the  work  is  not  complete,  that 
the  artist  here  intends  a  roof,  a  window  there,  here  a  tower, 
and  over  all  a  heaven-piercing  spire.     All  men  are  abor- 
tions, our  failure  pointing  to  the  real  success.     Nay,  we  are 
all  waiting  to  be  born,  our  whole  nature  looking  to  another 
world,  and  dimly  presaging  what  that  world  shall  be.    Death, 
however  we  misname  him,  seasonable  or  out  of  time,  is  the 
birth-angel,  that  alone. 

5.  Besides,  the  presence  of  injustice,  of  wrong,  points  the 
same  way.     The  fact  that  one  man  goes  out  of  this  life  in 
childhood,   in   manhood,   at    any   time    before   the    natural 
measure  of  his  days  is  full ;  the  fact  that  any  one  is  by  cir- 
cumstances made  wretched  ;  that  he  is  hindered  from  his 
proper  growth  and  has  not  here  his  natural  due  —  all  inti- 
mates to  me  his    future  life.     I  know  that  God  is  just.     I 
know  His  justice  too  shall   make   all  things  right,  for  He 
must  have  the  power,  the  wish,  the  will  therefor,  to  speak 
in  human  speech.     I  see  the  injustice  in  this  city,  its  pau- 
perism, suffering,  and  crime,  men  smarting  all  their  life,  and 
by  no  fault  of  theirs.     I  know  there  must  be  another  hemis- 
phere to  balance  this ;    another  life,  wherein  justice   shall 
come  to  all  and  for  all.     Else  God  were  unjust ;  and  an 
unjust  God  to  me  is  no  God  at  all,  but  a  wretched  chimera 
which  my  soul  rejects  with  scorn.     T  see  the  autumn  pre- 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  381 

figured  in  the  spring.  The  flowers  of  May-day  foretold  the 
harvest,  its  rosy  apples  and  its  yellow  ears  of  corn.  As  the 
bud  now  lying  cold  and  close  upon  the  bark  of  every  tree 
throughout  our  northern  clime  is  a  silent  prophecy  of  yet 
another  spring  and  other  summers,  and  harvests  too;  so 
this  instinctive  love  of  justice  scantly  budding  here  and 
nipped  by  adverse  fate,  silently  but  clearly  tells  of  a  king- 
dom of  heaven.  I  take  some  miserable  child  here  in  this 
city,  squalid  in  dress  and  look,  ignorant  and  wicked  too  as 
most  men  judge  of  vagrant  vice,  made  so  by  circumstances 
over  which  that  child  had  no  control ;  I  turn  off  with  a  shud- 
der at  the  public  wrong  we  have  done  and  still  are  doing  ; 
but  in  that  child  I  see  proof  of  another  world,  yes,  Heaven 
glittering  from  behind  those  saddened  eyes.  I  know  that 
child  has  a  man's  nature  in  him,  perhaps  a  Channing's 
trusting  piety  ;  perhaps  a  Newton's  mind  ;  has  surely  rudi- 
ments of  more  than  these  ;  for  what  were  Channing,  Newton, 
both  of  them,  but  embryo  men  ?  I  turn  off  with  a  shudder 
at  the  public  wrong,  but  a  faith  in  God's  justice,  in  that 
child's  eternal  life,  which  nothing  can  ever  shake. 

III.  A  third  argument  is  drawn  from  the  nature  of  God. 
He,  as  the  infinite,  the  unconditioned,  the  absolute,  is  all- 
powerful,  all-wise,  all-good.  Therefore  he  must  wish  the 
best  of  all  possible  things  ;  must  know  the  best  of  all  possi- 
ble things  ;  must  will  the  best  of  all  possible  things,  and  so 
bring  it  to  pass.  Life  is  a  possible  thing ;  eternal  life  is 
possible.  Neither  implies  a  contradiction  ;  yes,  to  me  they 
seem  necessary,  more  than  possible.  Now,  then,  as  life, 
serene  and  happy  life,  is  better  than  non-existence,  so  im- 
mortality is  better  than  perpetual  death.  God  must  know 
that,  wish  that,  will  that,  and  so  bring  that  about.  Man, 
therefore,  must  be  immortal.  This  argument  is  brief  indeed, 
but  I  see  not  how  it  can  be  withstood. 

1  do  not  know  that  one  of  you  doubts  of  eternal  life.  If 
any  does,  I  know  not  if  these  thoughts  will  ever  affect  his 


382  SERMON    OF 

doubt.  Still,  I  think  each  argument  is  powerful ;  to  one 
that  thinks,  reasons,  balances,  and  then  decides,  exceeding 
powerful.  All  put  together  form  a  mass  of  argument  which, 
as  it  seems  to  me,  no  logic  can  resist.  Yet  I  beg  you  to 
understand  that  I  do  not  rest  immortality  on  any  reasoning 
of  mine,  but  on  reason  itself;  not  on  these  logical  argu- 
ments, but  on  man's  consciousness,  and  the  instinctive  belief 
which  is  common  to  the  human  race.  I  believed  my  im- 
mortality before  I  proved  it ;  believed  it  just  as  strongly 
then  as  now.  Nay,  could  some  doubter  rise,  and,  to  my 
thinking,  vanquish  all  these  arguments,  I  should  still  hold 
fast  my  native  faith,  nor  fear  the  doubter's  arms.  The 
simple  consciousness  of  men  is  stronger  than  all  forms  of 
proof.  Still,  if  men  want  arguments  —  why,  there  they 
are. 

The  belief  in  immortality  is  one  thing ;  the  special  form 
thereof,  the  definite  notion  of  the  future  life,  another  and 
quite  different.  The  popular  doctrine  in  our  churches  I 
think  is  this  :  That  this  body  which  we  lay  in  the  dust  shall 
one  day  be  raised  again,  the  living  soul  joined  on  anew, 
and  both  together  live  the  eternal  life.  But  where  is  the 
soul  all  this  time,  between  our  death-day  and  our  day  of 
rising  ?  Some  say  it  sleeps  unconscious,  dead  all  this  time  ; 
others,  that  it  is  in  Heaven  now,  or  else  in  hell ;  others,  in  a 
strange  and  transient  home,  imperfect  in  its  joy  or  woe,  wait- 
ing the  final  day  and  more  complete  account.  It  seems  to 
me  this  notion  is  absurd  and  impossible :  absurd  in  its  doctrine 
relative  to  the  present  condition  of  departed  souls  ;  impossible 
in  what  it  teaches  of  the  resurrection  of  this  body.  If  my  soul 
is  to  claim  the  body  again,  which  shall  it  be,  the  body  I  was 
born  into,  or  that  I  died  out  of?  If  I  live  to  the  common  age 
of  men,  changing  my  body  as  I  must,  and  dying  daily,  then  I 
have  worn  some  eight  or  ten  bodies.  So  at  the  last  which  body 
shall  claim  my  soul,  for  the  ten  had  her  ?  The  soul  herself 
may  claim  them  all.  But  to  make  the  matter  still  more  in- 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  383 

tricate,  there  is  in  the  earth  but  a  certain  portion  of  matter 
out  of  which  human  bodies  can  be  made.  Considering  all 
the  millions  of  men  now  living,  the  myriads  of  millions  that 
have  been  before,  it  is  plain,  I  think,  that  all  the  matter 
suitable  for  human  bodies  has  been  lived  over  many  times. 
So  if  the  world  were  to  end  to-day,  instead  of  each  old  man 
having  ten  bodies  from  which  to  choose  the  one  that  fits 
him  best,  there  would  be  ten  men,  all  clamoring  for  each 
body  !•  Shall  I  then  have  a  handful  of  my  former  dust,  and 
that  alone  ?  That  is  not  the  resurrection  of  my  former 
body.  This  whole  doctrine  of  the  resurrection  of  the  flesh 
seems  to  me  impossible  and  absurd. 

I  know  men  refer  this,  as  many  other  things  no  better,  to 
Jesus.  I  find  no  satisfactory  evidence  that  he  taught  the 
resurrection  of  the  body ;  there  is  some  evidence  that  he 
did  not.  I  know  it  was  the  doctrine  of  the  Pharisees  of 
his  time,  of  Paul,  the  early  Christians,  and  more  or  less 
of  the  Christian  churches  to  this  day.  In  Christ's  time  in 
Judea,  there  were  the  Sadducees,  who  taught  the  eternal 
death  of  men  ;  the  Pharisees,  who  taught  the  resurrection 
of  the  flesh  and  its  reunion  with  the  soul ;  the  Essenes,  who 
taught  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  but  rejected  the  resurrec- 
tion of  the  body.  Paul  was  a  Pharisee,  and  in  his  letters 
taught  the  resurrection  of  the  dead,  the  belief  of  the  Phari- 
sees. From  him  it  has  come  down  to  us,  and  in  the  creed 
of  many  churches  it  is  still  written,  "  I  believe  in  the  resur- 
rection of  the  flesh."  Many  doubted  this  in  early  times, 
but  the  council  of  Nice  declared  all  men  accursed  who 
dared  to  doubt  the  resurrection  of  the  flesh.  I  mention  this 
as  absurd  and  impossible,  because  it  is  still,  I  fear,  the  popu- 
lar belief,  and  lest  some  should  confound  the  doctrine  of 
immortality  with  this  tenet  of  the  Pharisees.  Let  it  be  re- 
membered the  immortality  of  the  soul  is  one  thing,  the 
resurrection  of  the  body  another  and  quite  different. 

What  is  this  future  life  ?  what  can  we  know  of  it  besides 


384  SERMON    OF 

its  existence  ?  Some  men  speak  as  if  they  knew  the  way 
about  Heaven  as  around  the  wards  of  their  native  city. 
What  we  can  know  in  detail  is  cautiously  to  be  inferred 
from  the  nature  of  man  and  the  nature  of  God.  I  will 
modestly  set  down  what  seems  to  me. 

It  must  be  a  conscious  state.  Man  is  by  his  nature  con- 
scious ;  yes,  self-conscious.  He  is  progressive  in  his  self- 
consciousness.  I  cannot  think  a  removal  out  of  the  body 
destroys  this  consciousness  ;  rather  that  it  enhancers  and 
intensifies  this.  Yet  consciousness  in  the  next  life  must 
differ  as  much  from  consciousness  here  as  the  ripe  peach 
differs  from  the  blossom,  or  the  bud,  or  the  bark,  or  the 
earthy  materials  out  of  which  it  grew.  The  child  is  no 
limit  to  the  man,  nor  my  consciousness  now  to  what  I  may 
be,  must  be  hereafter. 

It  must  be  a  social  state.  Our  nature  is  social  ;  our  joys 
social.  For  our  progress  here,  our  happiness,  we  depend  on 
one  another.  Must  it  not  be  so  there  ?  It  must  be  an  ad- 
vance upon  our  nature  and  condition  here.  All  the  analogy 
of  nature  teaches  that.  Things  advance  from  small  to  great ; 
from  base  to  beautiful.  The  girl  grows  into  a  woman  ;  the 
bud  swells  into  the  blossom,  that  into  the  fruit.  The  process 
over,  the  work  begins  anew.  How  much  more  must  it  be 
so  in  the  other  life.  What  old  powers  we  shall  discover  now 
buried  in  the  flesh ;  what  new  powers  shall  come  upon  us  in 
that  new  state,  no  man  can  know  ;  it  were  but  poetic  idle- 
ness to  talk  of  them.  We  see  in  some  great  man,  what 
power  of  intellect,  imagination,  justice,  goodness,  piety,  he 
reveals  lying  latent  in  us  all.  How  men  bungle  in  their 
Avorks  of  art !  No  Raphael  can  paint  a  dew-drop  or  a  flake 
of  frost.  Yet  some  rude  man,  tired  with  his  work,  lies  down 
beneath  a  tree,  his  head  upon  his  swarthy  arm,  sleep  shuts, 
one  by  one,  these  five  scant  portals  of  the  soul,  and  what  an 
artist  is  he  made  at  once  !  How  brave  a  sky  he  paints 
above  him,  with  what  golden  garniture  of  clouds  set  off; 
what  flowers  and  trees,  what  men  and  women  does  he  not 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  385 

create,  and  moving  in  celestial  scenes !  What  years  of  his- 
tory does  he  condense  in  one  short  minute,  and  when  he 
wakes,  shakes  ofi'  the  purple  drapery  of  his  dream  as  if  it 
were  but  worthless  dust  and  girds  him  for  his  work  anew  ! 
What  other  powers  there  are  shut  up  in  men  less  known 
than  this  artistic  phantasy  ;  powers  of  seeing  the  distant,  re- 
calling the  past,  predicting  the  future,  feeling  at  once  the 
character  of  men  —  of  this  we  know  little,  only  by  rare 
glimpses  at  the  unwonted  side  of  things.  But  yet  we  know 
enough  to  guess  there  are  strange  wonders  there  waiting  to 
be  revealed. 

What  form  our  conscious,  social,  and  increased  activity 
shall  take,  we  know  not.  We  know  of  that  no  more  than 
before  our  birth  we  knew  of  this  world,  of  sight,  srnell,  hear- 
ing, taste,  and  touch,  or  the  things  which  they  reveal.  We 
are  not  born  into  that  world,  have  not  its  senses  yet.  This 
we  know,  that  the  same  God,  all-powerful,  all-wise,  all-good, 
rules  there  and  then,  as  here  and  now.  Who  cannot  trust 
Him  to  do  right  and  best  for  all  ?  For  my  own  part,  I  feel 
no  wish  to  know  how,  or  where,  or  what  I  shall  be  hereafter. 
1  know  it  will  be  right  for  my  truest  welfare  ;  for  the  good 
of  all.  I  am  satisfied  with  this  trust. 

Yet  the  next  life  must  be  a  state  of  retribution.  Thither 
we  carry  nothing  but  ourselves,  our  naked  selves.  Our 
fortune  we  leave  behind  us;  our  honors  and  rank  return  to 
such  as  gave  ;  even  our  reputation,  the  good  or  ill  men 
thought  we  were,  clings  to  us  no  more.  We  go  thither  with- 
out our  staff  or  scrip  ;  nothing  but  the  man  we  are.  Yet 
that  man  is  the  result  of  all  life's  daily  work ;  it  is  the  one 
thing  which  we  have  brought  to  pass.  I  cannot  believe  men 
who  have  voluntarily  lived  mean,  little,  vulgar  and  selfish 
lives,  will  go  out  of  this  and  into  that,  great,  noble,  generous, 
good,  and  holy.  Can  the  practical  saint  and  the  practical 
hypocrite  enter  on  the  same  course  of  being  together? 
I  know  the  sufferings  of  bad  men  here,  the  wrong  they  do 
their  nature,  and  what  comes  of  that  wrong.  I  think  that 
33 


386  SERMON    OF 

suffering  is  the  best  part  of  sin,  the  medicine  to  heal  it  with. 
What  men  suffer  here  from  their  wrong-doing  is  its  natural 
consequence  ;  but  all  that  suffering  is  a  mercy,  designed  to 
make  them  better.  Every  thing  in  this  world  is  adapted 
to  promote  the  welfare  of  God's  creatures.  Must  it  not  be 
so  in  the  next  ?  How  many  men  seem  wicked  from  our 
point  of  view,  who  are  not  so  from  their  own ;  how  many 
become  infamous  through  no  fault  of  theirs  ;  the  victims  of 
circumstances,  born  into  crime,  of  low  and  corrupt  parents, 
whom  former  circumstances  made  corrupt !  Such  men  can- 
not be  sinners  before  God.  Here  they  suffer  from  the 
tyranny  of  appetites  they  never  were  taught  to  subdue  ; 
they  have  not  the  joy  of  a  cultivated  mind.  The  children 
of  the  wild  Indian  are  capable  of  the  same  cultivation  as 
children  here  ;  yet  they  are  savages.  Is  it  always  to  be  so  ? 
Is  God  to  be  partial  in  granting  the  favors  of  another  life  ? 
I  cannot  believe  it.  I  doubt  not  that  many  a  soul  rises  up 
from  the  dungeon  and  the  gallows,  yes,  from  dens  of  infamy 
amongst  men,  clean  and  beautiful  before  God.  Christ,  says 
the  Gospel,  assured  the  penitent  thief  of  sharing  heaven 
with  him  — and  that  day.  Many  seem  inferior  to  me,  who 
in  God's  sight  must  be  far  before  me  ;  men  who  now  seem 
too  low  to  learn  of  me  here,  may  be  too  high  to  teach  me 
there. 

I  cannot  think  the  future  world  is  to  be  feared,  even  by 
the  worst  of  men.  I  had  rather  die  a  sinner  than  live  one. 
Doubtless  justice  is  there  to  be  done  ;  that  may  seem  stern 
and  severe.  But  remember  God's  justice  is  not  like  a 
man's ;  it  is  not  vengeance,  but  mercy  ;  not  poison,  but 
medicine.  To  me  it  seems  tuition  more  than  chastisement. 
God  is  not  the  Jailer  of  the  Universe,  but  the  Shepherd  of 
the  people  ;  not  the  Hangman  of  mankind,  but  their  Phy- 
sician ;  yes,  our  Father.  I  cannot  fear  Him  as  I  fear  men. 
i  cannot  fail  to  love.  I  abhor  sin,  I  loathe  and  nauseate 
thereat ;  most  of  all  at  my  own.  I  can  plead  for  others 
and  extenuate  their  guilt,  perhaps  they  for  mine  ;  not  I  for 


IMMORTAL    LITE.  387 

my  own.  I  know  God's  justice  will  overtake  me,  giving  me 
what  I  have  paid  for.  But  1  do  not,  cannot  fear  it.  I  know 
His  justice  is  love  ;  that  if  I  suffer,  it  is  for  my  everlasting 
joy.  I  think  this  is  a  natural  state  of  mind.  I  do  not  find 
that  men  ever  dread  the  future  life,  or  turn  pale  on  their 
death-bed  at  thought  of  God's  vengeance,  except  when  a 
priesthood  has  frightened  them  to  that.  The  world's  lite- 
rature, which  is  the  world's  confession,  proves  what  I  say. 
In  Greece,  in  classic  days,  when  there  was  no  caste  of 
priests,  the  belief  in  immortality  was  current  and  strong. 
But  in  all  her  varied  literature  I  do  not  remember  a  man 
dying,  yet  afraid  of  God's  vengeance.  The  rude  Indian 
of  our  native  land  did  not  fear  to  meet  the  Great  Spirit, 
face  to  face.  I  have  sat  by  the  bedside  of  wicked  men, 
and  while  death  was  dealing  with  my  brother,  I  have 
watched  the  tide  slow  ebbing  from  the  shore,  but  I  have 
known  no  one  afraid  to  go.  Say  what  we  will,  there  is 
nothing  deeper  and  stronger  in  men  than  confidence  in  God, 
a  solemn  trust  that  He  will  do  us  good.  Even  the  worst 
man  thinks  God  his  Father  ;  and  is  He  not  ?  Tell  me  not 
of  God's  vengeance,  punishing  men  for  his  own  glory  ! 
There  is  no  such  thing.  Talk  not  to  me  of  endless  hell, 
where  men  must  suffer  for  suffering's  sake,  be  damned  for 
an  eternity  of  woe.  I  tell  you  there  is  no  such  thing,  nor 
can  there  ever  be.  Does  not  even  the  hireling  shepherd, 
when  a  single  lamb  has  gone  astray,  leave  the  ninety  and 
nine  safe  in  their  fold,  go  forth  some  stormy  night  and 
seek  the  wanderer,  rejoicing  to  bring  home  the  lost  one 
on  his  shoulders  ?  And  shall  God  forget  His  child,  His 
frailest  or  most  stubborn  child  ;  leave  him  in  endless  mis- 
ery, a  prey  to  insatiate  Sin,  that  grim,  bloodthirsty  wolf, 
prowling  about  the  human  fold  ?  I  tell  you  No  ;  not  God. 
Why,  this  eccentric  earth  forsakes  the  sun  awhile,  careering 
fast  and  far  away,  but  that  attractive  power  prevails  at 
length,  and  the  returning  globe  comes  rounding  home 
again.  Does  a  mortal  mother  desert  her  son,  wicked,  cor- 


3S8  SERMON    OF 

rupt,  and  loathsome  though  he  be  ?  If  so,  the  wiser  world 
cries,  Shame  !  But  she  does  not.  When  her  child  becomes 
loathsome  and  hateful  to  the  world,  drunk  with  wickedness, 
and  when  the  wicked  world  puts  him  away  out  of  its  sight, 
strangling  him  to  death,  that  mother  forgets  not  her  child. 
She  had  his  earliest  kiss  from  lips  all  innocent  of  coming  ill, 
and  she  will  have  his  last.  Yes,  she  will  press  his  cold  and 
stiffened  form  to  her  own  bosom  ;  the  bosom  that  bore  and 
fed  the  innocent  babe  yearns  yet  with  mortal  longing  for 
the  murdered  murderer.  Infamous  to  the  world,  his  very 
dust  is  sacred  dust  to  her.  She  braves  the  world's  reproach, 
buries  her  son,  piously  hoping,  that  as  their  lives  once  min- 
gled, so  their  ashes  shall.  The  world,  cruel  and  forgetful 
oft,  honors  the  mother  in  its  deepest  heart.  Do  you  tell  me 
that  culprit's  mother  loves  her  son  more  than  God  can  love 
him  ?  Then  go  and  worship  her.  I  know  that  when  father 
and  mother  both  forsake  me,  in  the  extremity  of  my  sin,  I 
know  my  God  loves  on.  Oh  yes,  ye  sons  of  men,  Indian 
and  Greek,  ye  are  right  to  trust  your  God.  Do  priests  and 
their  churches  say  No !  —  bid  them  go  and  be  silent  for 
ever.  No  grain  of  dust  gets  lost  from  off  this  dusty  globe ; 
and  shall  God  lose  a  man  from  off  this  sphere  of  souls  ? 
Believe  it  not. 

I  know  that  suffering  follows  sin,  lasting  long  as  the  sin. 
I  thank  God  it  is  so  ;  that  God's  own  angel  stands  there  to 
warn  back  the  erring  Balaams,  wandering  towards  woe. 
But  God,  who  sends  the  rain,  the  dew,  the  sun,  on  me  as  on 
a  better  man,  will,  at  last,  I  doubt  it  not,  make  us  all  pure, 
all  just,  all  good,  and  so,  at  last,  all  happy.  This  follows 
from  the  nature  of  God  himself,  for  the  All-good  must  wish 
the  welfare  of  His  child ;  the  All-wise  know  how  to  achieve 
that  welfare  ;  the  All-powerful  bring  it  to  pass.  Tell  me  He 
wishes  not  the  eternal  welfare  of  all  men,  then  I  say  That  is 
not  the  God  of  the  universe.  I  own  not  that  as  God.  Nay, 
I  tell  you  it  is  not  God  you  speak  of,  but  some  heathen 
fancy,  smoking  up  from  your  unhuman  heart.  I  would  ask 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  389 

the  worst  of  mothers,  Did  you  forsake  your  child  because 
he  went  astray,  and  mocked  your  word  ?  "  Oh  no,"  she 
says;  "  he  was  but  a  child,  he  knew  no  better,  and  I  led 
him  right,  corrected  him  for  his  good,  not  mine  ! "  Are 
we  not  all  children  before  God ;  the  wisest,  oldest,  wicked- 
est, God's  child  !  I  am  sure  He  will  never  forsake  me,  how 
wicked  soever  I  become.  I  know  that  He  is  love  ;  love, 
too,  that  never  fails.  I  expect  to  suffer  for  each  conscious, 
wilful  wrong ;  I  wish,  I  hope,  I  long  to  suffer  for  it.  I  am 
wronged  if  I  do  not ;  what  I  do  not  outgrow,  live  over  and 
forget  here,  I  hope  to  expiate  there.  I  fear  a  sin ;  not  to 
outgrow  a  sin. 

A  man  who  has  lived  here  a  manly  life,  must  enter  the 
next  under  the  most  favorable  circumstances.  I  do  not 
mean  a  man  of  mere  negative  goodness,  starting  in  the  road 
of  old  custom,  with  his  wheels  deep  in  the  ruts,  not  having 
life  enough  lo  go  aside,  but  a  positively  good  man,  one 
bravely  good.  He  has  lived  heaven  here,  and  must  enter 
higher  up  than  a  really  wicked  man,  or  a  slothful  one,  or 
one  but  negatively  good.  He  can  go  from  earth  to  heaven, 
as  from  one  room  to  another,  pass  gradually,  as  from  winter 
to  spring.  To  such  an  one,  no  revolution  appears  needed. 
The  next  life,  it  seems,  must  be  a  continual  progress,  the 
improvement  of  old  powers,  the  disclosure  or  accession  of 
new  ones.  What  nobler  reach  of  thought,  what  profounder 
insight,  what  more  heavenly  imagination,  what  greater 
power  of  conscience,  faith  and  love,  will  bless  us  there  and 
then,  it  were  vain  to  calculate,  it  is  far  beyond  our  span. 
You  see  men  now,  whose  souls  are  one  with  God,  and  so 
His  will  works  through  them  as  the  magnetic  fire  runs  on 
along  the  unimpeding  line.  What  happiness  they  have,  it 
is  they  alone  can  say.  How  much  greater  must  it  be  there  ; 
not  even  they  can  tell.  Here  the  body  helps  us  to  some 
things.  Through  these  five  small  loop-holes  the  world  looks 
in.  How  much  more  does  the  body  hinder  us  from  seeing? 
33* 


390  SERMON    OF 

Through  the  sickly  body  yet  other  worlds  look  in.  He  who 
has  seen  only  the  daylight,  knows  nothing  of  that  heaven  of 
stars,  which  all  night  long  hang  overhead  their  lamps  of 
gold.  When  death  has  dusted  off  this  body  from  me,  who 
will  dream  for  me  the  new  powers  I  shall  possess?  It  were 
vain  to  try.  Time  shall  reveal  it  all. 

I  cannot  believe  that  any  state  in  Heaven  is  a  final  state, 
only  a  condition  of  progress.  The  bud  opens  into  the  blos- 
som, the  flower  matures  into  the  fruit.  The  salvation  of 
to-day  is  not  blessedness  enough  for  to-morrow.  Here  we 
are  first  babes  of  earth,  with  a  few  senses,  and  those  imper- 
fect, helpless  and  ignorant ;  then  children  of  earth  ;  then 
youths  ;  then  men,  armed  with  reason,  conscience,  affection, 
piety,  and  go  on  enlarging  these  without  end.  So  methinks 
it  'must  be  there,  that  we  shall  be  first  babes  of  Heaven,  then 
children,  next  youths,  and  so  go  on  growing,  advancing  and 
advancing  —  our  being  only  a  becoming  more  and  more, 
with  no  possibility  of  ever  reaching  the  end.  If  this  be 
true,  then  there  must  be  a  continual  increase  of  being.  So, 
in  some  future  age,  the  time  will  come,  when  each  one  of 
us  shall  have  more  mind,  and  heart,  and  soul,  than  Christ  on 
earth  ;  more  than  all  men  now  on  earth  have  ever  had  ; 
yes,  more  than  they  and  all  the  souls  of  men  now  passed  to 
Heaven  ;  —  shall  have,  each  one  of  us,  more  being  than  they 
all  have  had,  and  so  more  truth,  more  soul,  more  faith,  more 
rest  and  bliss  of  life. 

Do  men  of  the  next  world  look  in  upon  this  ?  Are  they 
present  with  us,  conscious  of  our  deeds  or  thoughts  ?  Who 
knows  ?  Who  can  say  aye  or  no  ?  The  unborn  know 
nothing  of  the  life  on  earth  ;  yet  the  born  of  earth  know 
somewhat  of  them,  and  make  ready  for  their  coming. 
Who  knows  but  men  born  to  heaven  are  waiting  for  your 
birth  to  come  —  have  gone  to  prepare  a  place  for  us  ?  All 
that  is  fancy,  and  not  fact ;  it  is  not  philosophy,  but  poetry ; 
no  more.  Of  this  we  may  be  sure,  that  what  is  best  will 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  391 

be  ;  what  best  for  saint  or  sinner ;  what  most  conducive  to 
their  real  good.  That  is  no  poetry,  but  unavoidable  truth, 
which  all  mankind  may  well  believe. 

There  are  many  who  never  attained  their  true  stature 
here,  yet  without  blameworthiness  of  theirs ;  men  cheated 
of  their  growth.  Many  a  Milton  walks  on  his  silent  way, 
and  goes  down  at  last,  not  singing  and  unsung.  How  many 
a  possible  Newton  or  Descartes  has  dug  the  sewers  of  a 
city,  and  dies,  giving  no  sign  of  the  wealthy  soul  he  bore ! 

"  Chill  penury  repressed  his  noble  rage, 
And  froze  the  genial  current  of  the  soul." 

What  if  the  best  of  you  had  been  born  slaves  in  North 
Carolina,  or  among  savages  at  New  Zealand  ;  nay,  in  some 
of  the  filthy  cellars  of  Boston,  and  turned  friendless  into  the 
streets ;  what  might  you  have  become  ?  Surely  not  what 
you  are  ;  yet,  before  God,  you  might,  perhaps,  be  more  de- 
serving, and,  at  death,  go  to  a  far  higher  place.  What  is  so 
terribly  wrong  here,  must  be  righted  there.  It  cannot  be  that 
God  will  thrust  a  man  out  of  Heaven,  because  his  mother 
was  a  savage,  a  slave,  a  pauper,  or  a  criminal.  It  is  men's 
impiety  which  does  so  here,  not  Heaven's  justice  there  ! 
How  the  wrong  shall  be  righted  I  know  not,  care  not  now 
to  know  ;  of  the  fact  I  ask  no  further  certainty.  Many  that 
are  last  shall  be  first.  It  may  be  that  the  pirate,  in  heaven, 
having  outgrown  his  earthly  sins,  shall  teach  justice  to  the 
judge  who  hanged  him  here.  They  who  were  oppressed 
and  trampled  on,  kept  down,  dwarfed,  stinted  and  emaciate 
in  soul,  must  have  justice  done  them  there,  and  will  doubt- 
less stand  higher  in  Heaven  than  we,  who,  having  many 
talents,  used  them  poorly,  or  hid  them  idle  in  the  dirt,  know- 
ing our  Father's  will,  yet  heeding  not.  It  was  Jesus  that 
said,  Many  shall  come  from  the  east  and  the  west,  and  sit 
down  in  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  men,  calling  themselves 
saints,  be  thrust  out. 


392  SERMON    OF 

Shall  we  remember  the  deeds  of  the  former  life  ;  this 
man  that  he  picked  rags  out  of  the  mud  in  the  streets,  and 
another  that  he  ruled  nations  ?  Who  can  tell  ;  nay,  who 
need  care  to  ask  ?  Such  a  remembrance  seems  not  needed 
for  retribution's  sake.  The  oak  remembers  not  each  leaf 
it  ever  bore,  though  each  helped  to  form  the  oak,  its  branch 
and  bole.  How  much  has  gone  from  our  bodies  !  we  know 
not  how  it  came  or  went !  How  much  of  our  past  life  is 
gone  from  our  memory,  yet  its  result  lives  in  our  character ! 
The  saddler  remembers  not  every  stitch  he  took  while  an 
apprentice,  yet  each  stitch  helped  form  the  saddler. 

Shall  we  know  our  friends  again  ?  For  my  own  part  I 
cannot  doubt  it ;  least  of  all  when  I  drop  a  tear  over  their 
recent  dust.  Death  does  not  separate  them  from  us  here. 
Can  life  in  heaven  do  it  ?  They  live  in  our  remembrance  ; 
memory  rakes  in  the  ashes  of  the  dead,  and  the  virtues  of 
the  departed  flame  up  anew,  enlightening  the  dim  cold 
walls  of  our  consciousness.  Much  of  our  joy  is  social  here  ; 
we  only  half  enjoy  an  undivided  good.  God  made  mankind, 
but  sundered  that  into  men,  that  they  might  help  one  another. 
Must  it  not  be  so  there,  and  we  be  with  our  real  friends  ? 
Man  loves  to  think  it ;  yet  to  trust  is  wiser  than  to  prophesy. 
But  the  girl  who  went  from  us  a  little  one  may  be  as  parent 
to  her  father  when  he  comes,  and  the  man  who  left  us  have 
far  outgrown  our  dream  of  an  angel  when  we  meet  again. 
1  cannot  doubt  that  many  a  man  who  not  long  ago  left  his 
body  here,  now  far  surpasses  the  radiant  manliness  which 
Jesus  won  and  wore  ;  yes,  is  far  better,  greater,  too,  than 
many  poorly  conceive  of  God. 

There  are  times  when  we  think  little  of  a  future  life.  In 
a  period  of  success,  serene  and  healthy  life ;  the  day's  good 
is  good  enough  for  that  day.  But  there  comes  a  time  when 
this  day's  good  is  not  enough ;  its  ill  too  great  to  bear. 
When  death  comes  down  and  wrenches  off  a  friend  from 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  393 

our  side ;  wife,  child,  brother,  father,  a  dear  one  taken  ; 
this  life  is  not  enough.  Oh,  no,  not  to  the  coldest,  coarsest, 
and  most  sensual  man.  I  put  it  to  you,  to  the  most  heart- 
less of  you  all,  or  the  most  cold  and  doubting  —  When  you 
lay  down  in  the  earth  your  mother,  sister,  wife,  or  child, 
remembering  that  you  shall  see  their  face  no  more,  is  life 
enough  ?  Do  you  not  reach  out  your  arms  for  heaven,  for 
immortality,  and  feel  you  cannot  die  ?  When  I  see  men  at 
a  feast,  or  busy  in  the  street,  I  do  not  think  of  their  eternal 
life  ;  perhaps  feel  not  my  own.  But  when  the  stiffened 
body  goes  down  to  the  tomb,  sad,  silent,  remorseless,  I  feel 
there  is  no  death  for  the  man.  That  clod  which  yonder 
dust  shall  cover  is  not  my  brother.  The  dust  goes  to  its 
place,  the  man  to  his  own.  It  is  then  4  feel  my  immortality. 
I  look  through  the  grave  into  heaven.  I  ask  no  miracle,  no 
proof,  no  reasoning  for  me.  I  ask  no  risen  dust  to  teach 
me  immortality.  I  am  conscious  of  eternal  life. 

But  there  are  worse  hours  than  these :  seasons  bitterer 
than  death,  sorrows  lhat  lie  a  latent  poison  in  the  heart, 
slowly  sapping  the  foundations  of  our  peace.  There  are 
hours  when  the  best  life  seems  a  sheer  failure  to  the  man 
who  lived  it,  his  wisdom  folly,  his  genius  impotence,  his 
best  deed  poor  and  small ;  when  he  wonders  why  he  was 
suffered  to  be  born  ;  when  all  the  sorrows  of  the  world  seem 
poured  upon  him  ;  when  he  stands  in  a  populous  loneliness, 
and  though  weak,  can  only  lean  in  upon  himself.  In  such 
hours  he  feels  the  insufficiency  of  this  life.  It  is  only  his 
cradle-time,  he  counts  himself  just  born ;  all  honors,  wealth 
and  fame  are  but  baubles  in  his  baby  hand  ;  his  deep  phi- 
losophy but  nursery  rhymes.  Yet  he  feels  the  immortal 
fire  burning  in  his  heart.  He  stretches  his  hands  out  from 
the  swaddling-clothes  of  flesh,  reaching  after  the  topmost 
star,  which  he  sees,  or  dreams  he  sees,  and  longs  to  go 
alone.  Still  worse,  the  consciousness  of  sin  comes  over 
him ;  he  feels  that  he  has  insulted  himself.  All  about  him 
seems  little  ;  himself  little,  yet  clamoring  to  be  great.  Then 


394  SERMON    OF 

we  feel  our  immortality ;  through  the  gairish  light  of  day 
we  see  a  star  or  two  beyond.  The  soul  within  us  feels  her 
wings,  contending  to  be  born,  impatient  for  the  sky,  and 
wrestles  with  the  earthly  worm  that  folds  us  in. 

"  Mysterious  Night !  when  our  first  Parent  knew 

Thee  from  report  divine,  and  heard  thy  name, 
Did  he  not  tremble  for  this  lovely  frame, 

This  glorious  canopy  of  light  and  blue  ? 
Yet  'neath  a  curtain  of  translucent  dew, 

Bathed  in  the  rays  of  the  great  setting  flame, 
Hesperus  with  the  host  of  heaven  came  ; 

And  lo,  Creation  widened  in  man's  view. 
Who  could  have  thought  such  darkness  lay  concealed 

Within  thy  beams,  0  Sun  ?  or  who  could  find, 
Whilst  fly  and  leaf  and  insect  stood  revealed, 

That  to  such  countless  orbs  thou  mad'st  us  blind  ? 
Why  do  we  then  shun  Death  with  anxious  strife  ? 

If  Light  can  thus  deceive,  wherefore  not  Life  ? " 

I  would  not  slight  this  wondrous  world.  I  love  its  day 
and  night.  Its  flowers  and  its  fruits  are  dear  to  me.  I 
would  not  wilfully  lose  sight  of  a  departing  cloud.  Every 
year  opens  new  beauty  in  a  star  ;  or  in  a  purple  gentian 
fringed  with  loveliness.  The  laws  too  of  matter  seem  more 
wonderful  the  more  I  study  them,  in  the  whirling  eddies  of 
the  dust,  in  the  curious  shells  of  former  life  buried  by 
thousands  in  a  grain  of  chalk,  or  in  the  shining  diagrams  of 
light  above  my  head.  Even  the  ugly  becomes  beautiful 
when  truly  seen.  I  see  the  jewel  in  the  bunchy  toad.  The 
more  I  live,  the  more  I  love  this  lovely  world  ;  feel  more 
its  Author  in  each  little  thing  ;  in  all  that  is  great.  But  yet  I 
feel  my  immortality  the  more.  In  childhood  the  conscious- 
ness of  immortal  life  buds  forth  feeble,  though  full  of 
promise.  In  the  man  it  unfolds  its  fragrant  petals,  his  most 
celestial  flower,  to  mature  its  seed  throughout  eternity. 
The  prospect  of  that  everlasting  life,  the  perfect  justice  yet 
to  come,  the  infinite  progress  before  us,  cheer  and  comfort 
the  heart.  Sad  and  disappointed,  full  of  self-reproach,  we 


IMMORTAL    LIFE.  395 

shall  not  be  so  for  ever.  The  light  of  heaven  breaks  upon 
the  night  of  trial,  sorrow,  sin  ;  the  sombre  clouds  which 
overhung  the  east,  grown  purple  now,  tell  us  the  dawn 
of  heaven  is  coming  in.  Our  faces,  gleamed  on  by  that, 
smile  in  the  new-born  glow ;  we  are  beguiled  of  our  sad- 
ness before  we  are  aware.  The  certainty  of  this  provokes 
us  to  patience,  it  forbids  us  to  be  slothfully  sorrowful.  It 
calls  us  to  be  up  and  doing.  The  thought  that  all  will  at 
last  be  right  with  the  slave,  the  poor,  the  .weak,  and  the 
wicked,  inspires  us  with  zeal  to  work  for  them  here,  and 
make  it  all  right  for  them  even  now. 

There  is  small  merit  in  being  willing  to  die  ;  it  seems 
almost  sinful  in  a  good  man  to  wish  it  when  the  world  needs 
him  here  so  much.  It  is  weak  and  unmanly  to  be  always 
looking  and  sighing  voluptuously  for  that.  But  it  is  of  great 
comfort  to  have  in  your  soul  a  sure  trust  in  immortality ;  of 
great  value  here  and  now  to  anticipate  time  and  live  to-day 
the  eternal  life.  That  we  may  all  do.  The  joys  of  heaven 
will  begin  as  soon  as  we  attain  the  character  of  heaven  and 
do  its  duties.  That  may  begin  to-day.  It  is  everlasting 
life  to  know  God,  to  have  His  Spirit  dwelling  in  you, 
yourself  at  one  with  Him.  Try  that  and  prove  its  worth. 
Justice,  usefulness,  wisdom,  religion,  love,  are  the  best 
things  we  hope  for  in  Heaven.  Try  them  on  — they  will  fit 
you  here  not  less  becomingly.  They  are  the  best  things  of 
earth.  Think  no  outlay  of  goodness  and  piety  too  great. 
You  will  find  your  reward  begin  here.  As  much  goodness 
and  piety,  so  much  Heaven.  Men  will  not  pay  you  —  God 
will ;  pay  you  now  ;  pay  you  hereafter  and  for  ever. 


XIV. 

THE  PUBLIC  EDUCATION  OF  THE  PEOPLE.  AN  ADDRESS  DELIVERED 
BEFORE  THE  ONONDAGA  TEACHERS'  INSTITUTE,  AT  SYRACUSE,  NEW 
YORK,  OCTOBER  4,  1849. 


EDUCATION  is  the  developing  and  furnishing  of  the  facul- 
ties of  man.  To  educate  the  people  is  one  of  the  functions 
of  the  State.  It  is  generally  allowed  in  the  free  States  of 
America,  that  the  community  owes  each  child  born  into  it 
a  chance  for  education,  intellectual,  moral,  and  religious. 
Hence  the  child  has  a  just  and  recognized  claim  on  the 
community  for  the  means  of  this  education,  which  is  to  be 
afforded  him,  not  as  a  charity,  but  as  a  right. 

This  fact  indicates  the  progress  mankind  has  made  in 
not  many  years.  Once  the  State  only  took  charge  of  the 
military  education  of  the  people  ;  not  at  all  of  their  intellec- 
tual, moral,  or  religious  culture.  They  received  their  mili- 
tary discipline,  not  for  the  special  and  personal  advantage 
of  the  individuals,  Thomas  and  Oliver,  but  for  the  benefit  of 
the  State.  They  received  it,  not  because  they  were  men 
claiming  it  in  virtue  of  their  manhood,  but  as  subjects  of 
the  State,  because  their  military  training  was  needful  for 
the  State,  or  for  its  rulers  who  took  the  name  thereof.  Then 
the  only  culture  which  the  community  took  public  pains  to 
bestow  on  its  members,  was  training  them  to  destroy.  The 
few,  destined  to  command,  learned  the  science  of  destruc- 
tion, and  the  kindred  science  of  defence  ;  the  many,  doomed 


EDUCATION    Of    T11K    PKOPLK.  397 

to  obey,  learned  only  the  art  to  destroy,  and  the  kindred  art 
of  defence. 

The  ablest  men  of  the  nation  were  sought  out  for  military 
teachers,  giving  practical  lessons  of  the  science  and  the  art ; 
they  were  covered  with  honor  and  loaded  with  gold.  The 
wealth  of  the  people  and  their  highest  science  went  to  this 
work.  Institutions  were  founded  to  promote  this  education, 
and  carefully  watched  over  by  the  State,  for  it  was  thought 
the  Commonwealth  depended  on  disciplined  valor.  The 
soldier  was  thought  to  be  the  type  of  the  State,  the  arche- 
type of  man  ;  accordingly  the  highest  spiritual  function  of 
the  State  was  the  production  of  soldiers. 

Most  of  the  civilized  nations  have  past  through  that  stage 
of  their  development :  though  the  few  or  the  many  arc 
still  taught  the  science  or  the  art  of  war  in  all  countries 
called  Christian,  there  is  yet  a  class  of  men  for  whom  the 
State  furnishes  the  means  of  education  that  is  not  military  ; 
means  of  education  which  the  individuals  of  that  class  could 
not  provide  for  themselves.  This  provision  is  made  at  the 
cost  of  the  State  ;  that  is,  at  the  cost  of  every  man  in  the 
State,  for  what  the  public  pays,  you  pay  and  I  pay,  rich  or 
poor,  willingly  and  consciously,  or  otherwise.  This  class  of 
men  is  different  in  different  countries,  and  their  education  is 
modified  to  suit  the  form  of  government  and  the  idea  of  the 
State.  In  Rome  the  State  provides  for  the  public  education 
of  priests.  Rome  is  an  ecclesiastical  State ;  her  govern- 
ment is  a  Theocracy  —  a  government  of  all  the  people,  but 
by  the  priests,  for  the  sake  of  the  priests,  and  in  the  nainu 
of  God.  Place  in  the  church  is  power,  bringing  honor  and 
wealth  ;  no  place  out  of  the  church  is  of  much  value.  The 
offices  are  filled  by  priests,  the  chief  magistrate  is  a  priest, 
supposed  to  derive  his  power  and  right  to  rule,  not  demo- 
cratically, from  the  people,  or, royally,  by  inheritance,  —  for 
in  theory  the  priest  is  as  if  he  had  no  father,  as  theoretically 
he  has  no  child, —  but  theccratically  from  God. 
34 


PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

In  Rome  the  priesthood  is  thought  to  be  the  flower  of  the 
State.  The  most  important  spiritual  function  of  the  State, 
therefore,  is  the  production  of  priests  ;  accordingly  the  great- 
est pains  are  taken  with  their  education.  Institutions  are 
founded  at  the  public  cost,  to  make  priests  out  of  men  ;  these 
institutions  are  the  favorites  of  government,  well  ordered, 
well  watched  over,  well  attended,  and  richly  honored.  In- 
stitutions for  the  education  of  the  people  are  of  small 
account,  ill  endowed,  watched  over  but  poorly,  thinly  at- 
tended, and  not  honored  at  all.  The  people  are  designed 
to  be  subjects  of  the  church,  and  as  little  culture  is  needed 
for  that,  though  much  to  make  them  citizens  thereof,  so  little 
is  given. 

As  there  are  institutions  for  the  education  of  the  priests, 
so  there  is  a  class  of  men  devoted  to  that  work  ;  able  men, 
well  disciplined,  sometimes  men  born  with  genius,  and 
always  men  furnished  with  the  accomplishments  of  sacer- 
dotal and  scientific  art ;  very  able  men,  very  well  disciplined, 
the  most  learned  and  accomplished  men  in  the  land.  These 
men  are  well  paid  and  abundantly  honored,  for  on  their 
faithfulness  the  power  of  the  priesthood,  and  so  the  welfare 
of  the  State,  is  thought  to  depend.  Without  the  allurement 
of  wealth  and  honors,  these  able  men  would  not  come  to 
this  work  ;  and  without  the  help  of  their  ability,  the  priests 
could  not  be  well  educated.  Hence  their  power  would  de- 
cline ;  the  class,  tonsured  and  consecrated  but  not  instructed, 
would  fall  into  contempt ;  the  theocracy  would  end.  So 
the  educators  of  the  priests  are  held  in  honor,  surrounded 
by  baits  for  vulgar  .eyes;  but  the  public  educators  of  the 
people,  chiefly  women  or  ignorant  men,  are  held  in  small 
esteem.  The  very  buildings  destined  to  the  education  of 
the  priests  are  conspicuous  and  stately  ;  the  colleges  of  the 
Jesuits,  the  Propaganda,  the  seminaries  for  the  education  of 
priests,  the  monasteries  for  training  the  more  wealthy  and 
regular  clergy,  are  great  establishments,  provided  with 
libraries,  and  furnished  with  all  the  apparatus  needful  for 


OF  TUB    PEOPLE.  399 

their  important  work.  But  the  school-houses  for  the  people 
are  small  and  mean  buildings,  ill  made,  ill  furnished,  and 
designed  for  a  work  thought  to  be  of  little  moment.  All 
this  is  in  strict  harmony  with  the  idea  of  the  theocracy, 
where  the  priesthood  is  mighty  and  the  people  are  subjects 
of  the  Church  ;  where  the  effort  of  the  State  is  toward*  re- 
ducing a  priest. 

In  England  tho  State  takes  charge  of  the  education  of 
another  class,  the  nobility  and  gentry  ;  that  is,  of  young  men 
of  ancient  and  historical  families,  the  nobility,  and  young 
men  of  fortune,  the  gentry.  England  is  an  oligarchical 
State  ;  her  government  an  aristocracy,  the  .government  of  all 
by  a  few,  the  nobility  and  gentry,  for  the  sake  of  a  few,  and 
in  the  name  of  a  king.  There  the  foundation  of  power  is 
wealth  and  birth  from  a  noble  family.  The  union  of  both 
takes  place  in  a  wealthy  noble.  There,  nobility  is  the  blos- 
som of  the  State  ;  aristocratic  birth  brings  wealth,  office, 
and  their  consequent  social  distinction.  Political  offices  are 
chiefly  monopolized  by  men  of  famous  birth  or  great  riches. 
The  king,  the  chief  officer  of  the  land,  must  surpass  all 
others  in  wealth,  and  the  pomp  and  circumstance  which 
comes  thereof,  and  in  aristocracy  of  birth.  He  is  not 
merely  noble  but  royal ;  his  right  to  rule  is  not  at  all  derived 
from  the  people,  but  from  his  birth.  Thus  he  has  the  two 
essentials  of  aristocratic  influence,  birth  and  wealth,  not 
merely  in  the  heroic  degree,  but  in  the  supreme  degree. 

As  the  State  is  an  aristocracy,  its  most  important  spiritual 
function  is  the  production  of  aristocrats  ;  each  noble  family 
transmits  the  full  power  of  its  blood  only  to  a  single  person 
—  the  oldest  son ;  of  the  highest  form,  the  royal,  only  one 
is  supposed  to  be  born  in  a  generation,  only  one  who 
receives  and  transmits  in  full  the  blood  royal. 

As  the  nobility  are  the  blossom  of  the  State,  great  pains 
must  be  taken  with  the  education  of  those  persons  born  of 
patrician  or  wealthy  families.  As  England  is  not  merely  a 


400  Pl'BMf    EDUCATION 

military  or  ecclesiastical  State,  though  partaking  largely  of 
both,  but  commercial,  agricultural  and  productive  in  many 
ways  ;  as  she  holds  a  very  prominent  place  in  the  politics 
of  the  world,  so  there  must  be  a  good  general  education 
provided  for  these  persons  ;  otherwise  their  power  would 
decline,  the  nobility  and  gentry  sink  into  contempt,  and  the 
government  pass  into  other  hands,  —  for  though  a  man  may 
be  born  to  rank  and  wealth,  he  is  not  born  to  knowledge, 
nor  to  practical  skill.  Hence  institutions 'are  founded  for 
the  education  of  the  aristocratic  class :  Oxford  and  Cam- 
brige,  "  those  twins  of  learning,"  with  their  preparatories 
and  help-meets. 

The  design  of  these  institutions  is  to  educate  the  young 
men  of  family  and  fortune.  The  aim  in  their  academic 
culture  is  not  as  in  Pagan  Rome,  a  military  State,  to  make 
soldiers,  nor  as  in  Christian  Rome,  to  turn  out  priests ;  it  is 
not,  as  in  the  German  universities,  to  furnish  the  world  with 
scholars  and  philosophers,  men  of  letters  and  science,  but 
to  mature  and  furnish  the  gentleman,  in  the  technical  sense 
of  that  word,  a  person  conventionally  fitted  to  do  the  work 
of  a  complicated  aristocratic  State,  to  fill  with  honor  its 
various  offices,  military,  political,  ecclesiastical  or  social,  and 
enjoy  the  dignity  which  comes  thereof.  These  universities 
furnish  the  individual  who  resorts  thither  with  opportunities 
not  otherwise  to  be  had  ;  they  are  purchased  at  the  cost  of 
the  State,  at  the  cost  of  each  man  in  the  State.  The  alum- 
nus at  Oxford  pays  his  term-bills,  indeed,  but  the  amount 
thereof  is  a  trifle  compared  to  the  actual  cost  of  his  resi- 
dence there  ;  mankind  pays  the  residue. 

These  institutions  are  continually  watched  over  by  the 
State,  which  is  the  official  guardian  of  aristocratic  education  ; 
they  are  occasionally  assisted  by  grants  from  the  public 
treasury,  though  they  are  chiefly  endowed  by  the  voluntary 
gifts  of  individual  men.  But  these  private  gifts,  like  the 
public  grants,  come  from  the  earnings  of  the  whole  nation. 
They  are  well  endowed,  superintended  well,  and  richly 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  401 

honored  ;  their  chancellors  and  vice-chancellors  are  men  of 
distinguished  social  rank  ;  they  have  their  representatives 
in  Parliament ;  able  men  are  sought  out  for  teachers,  pro- 
fessors, heads  of  houses  ;  men  of  good  ability,  of  masterly 
education,  and  the  accomplishments  of  a  finished  gentleman  ; 
they  are  well  paid,  and  copiously  rewarded  with  honors  and 
social  distinction.  Gentility  favors  these  institutions;  no- 
bility watches  over  them,  and  royalty  smiles  upon  them.  In 
this  threefold  sunlight,  no  wonder  that  they  thrive.  The 
buildings  at  their  service  are  among  the  most  costly  and 
elegant  in  the  land  ;  large  museums  are  attached  to  them, 
and  immense  libraries  ;  every  printer  in  England,  at  his 
own  cost,  must  give  a  copy  of  each  book  he  publishes  to 
Cambridge  and  Oxford.  What  wealth  can  buy,  or  artistic 
genius  can  create,  is  there  devoted  to  the  culture  of  this 
powerful  class. 

But  while  the  nobility  and  gentry  are  reckoned  the  flower 
of  the  State,  the  common  people  are  only  the  leaves,  and 
therefore  thought  of  small  importance  in  the  political  botany 
of  the  nation.  Their  education  is  amazingly  neglected ;  is 
mainly  left  to  the  accidental  piety  of  private  Christians, 
to  the  transient  charity  of  philanthropic  men,  or  the  "en- 
lightened self-interest  "  of  mechanics  and  small  traders,  who 
now  and  then  found  institutions  for  the  education  of  some 
small  fraction  of  the  multitude.  But  such  institutions  are 
little  favored  by  the  government,  or  the  spirit  of  the  domi- 
nant class  ;  gentility  does  not  frequent  them,  nor  nobility  help 
them,  nor  royalty  watch  over  to  foster  and  to  bless.  The 
Parliament,  which  voted  one  hundred  thousand  pounds  of  the 
nation's  money  for  the  queen's  horses  and  hounds,  had  but 
thirty  thousand  to  spare  for  the  education  of  her  people.  No 
honor  attends  the  educators  of  the  people  ;  no  wealth  is 
heaped  up  for  them  ;  no  beautiful  buildings  are  erected  for 
their  use  ;  no  great  libraries  got  ready  at  the  public  charge  ; 
no  costly  buildings  are  provided.  You  wonder  at  the 
colleges  and  collegiate  churches  of  Oxford  and  of  Cam- 
34* 


•102  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

bridge  ;  at  the  magnificence  of  public  edifices  in  London, 
new  or  ancient  —  the  House  of  Parliament,  the  Bank,  the 
palaces  of  royal  and  noble  men,  the  splendor  of  the 
churches  —  but  you  ask,  where  are  -the  school -houses  for 
the  people  ?  You  go  to  Bridewell  and  Newgate  for  the  an- 
swer. All  this  is  consistent  with  the  idea  of  an  aristocracy. 
The  gentleman  is  the  type  of  the  State ;  and  the  effort  of 
the  State  is  towards  producing  him.  The  people  require 
only  education  enough  to  become  the  servants  of  the  gen- 
tleman, and  seem  not  to  be  valued  for  their  own  sake, 
but  only  as  they  furnish  pabulum  for  the  flower  of  the 
oligarchy. 

In  Rome  and  England,  great  sums  have  been  given  by 
wealthy  men,  and  by  the  State  itself,  to  furnish  the  means 
of  a  theocratic  or  aristocratic  education  to  a  certain  class ; 
and  to  produce  the  national  priests,  and  the  national  gentle- 
men. There  public  education  is  the  privilege  of  a  few,  but 
bought  at  the  cost  of  the  many  ;  for  the  plough-boy  in  York- 
shire, who  has  not  culture  enough  to  read  the  petition  for 
daily  bread  in  the  Lord's  Prayer,  helps  pay  the  salary  of 
the  Master  of  Trinity,  and  the  swine-herd  in  the  Roman 
Campagna,  who  knows  nothing  of  religion,  except  what  he 
learns  at  Christmas  and  Easter,  by  seeing  the  Pope  carried 
on  men's  shoulders  into  St.  Peter's,  helps  support  the  Propo- 
ganda  and  the  Roman  College.  The  privileged  classes  are 
to  receive  an  education  under  the  eye  of  the  State,  which 
considers  itself  bound  to  furnish  them  the  means  of  a  public 
education,  partly  at  the  individual's  cost,  chiefly  at  the  cost 
of  the  public.  The  amount  of  education  depends  on  three 
things:  —  on  the  educational  attainments  of  the  human  race; 
on  the  wealth  and  tranquillity  of  the  special  nation,  enabling 
it  to  avail  itself  of  that  general  attainment ;  and  on  the  nat- 
ural powers  and  industry  of  the  particular  individual  in  the 
nation.  Such  is  the  solidarity  of  mankind  that  the  develop- 
ment of  the  individual  thus  depends  on  that  of  the  race, 
and  the  education  of  a  priest  in  Rome  or  a  gentleman  in 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  403 

England  is  the  resultant  of  these  three  forces,  — the  attain- 
ment of  mankind,  the  power  of  the  nation,  and  the  private 
character  and  conduct  of  the  man  himself.  Each  of  these 
three  is  a  variable  and  not  a  constant  quantity.  So  the 
amount  of  education  which  a  man  can  receive  at  Oxford  or 
at  Rome  fluctuates  and  depends  on  the  state  of  the  nation 
and  the  world  ;  but  as  the  attainments  of  mankind  have  much 
increased  within  a  few  years,  as  the  wealth  of  England  has 
increased,  and  her  tranquillity  become  more  secure,  you  see 
how  easy  it  becomes  for  the  State  to  offer  each  gentleman 
an  amount  of  education  which  it  would  have  been  quite  im- 
possible to  furnish  in  the  time  of  the  Yorks  and  the  Lan- 
casters. 

In  America  things  are  quite  other  and  different.  I  speak 
of  the  Free  States  of  the  North  ;  the  Slave  States  have  the 
worst  features  of  an  oligarchy  combined  with  a  theocratic 
pride  of  caste,  which  generates  continual  un-kindness;  there 
the  idea  of  the  State  is  found  inconsistent  with  the  general 
and  public  education  of  the  people ;  it  is  as  much  so  in 
South  Carolina  as  in  England  or  Rome ;  even  more  so,  for 
the  public  and  general  culture  of  all  is  only  dangerous  to  a 
theocracy  or  aristocracy  while  it  is  directly  fatal  to  slavery. 
In  England,  and  still  more  in  Catholic  Rome,  the  churches 
—  themselves  a  wonderful  museum  of  curiosities,  and  open 
all  the  day  to  all  persons  —  form  an  important  element 
for  the  education  of  the  most  neglected  class.  But  slavery 
and  education  of  the  people  are  incommensurable  quantities. 
No  amount  of  violence  can  be  their  common  measure.  The 
republic,  where  master  and  slave  were  equally  educated, 
would  soon  be  a  red-republic.  The  slave-master  knows 
this,  and  accordingly  puts  education  to  the  ban,  and  glories 
in  keeping  three  million  barbarians  in  the  land,  and,  of 
course,  suffers  the  necessary  degradation  which  comes 
thereof.  But  in  the  free  States  of  the  North  the  govern- 
ment is  not  a  theocracy,  or  an  aristocracy  ;  the  State,  in 


404  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

theory,  is  not  for  the  few,  nor  even  for  the  majority,  but  for 
all  ;  classes  are  notjpcognized,  and  therefore  not  protected 
in  any  privilege.  The  government  is  a  democracy,  the 
government  of  all,  by  all,  for  all,  and  in  the  name  of  all. 
A  man  is  born  to  all  the  rights  of  mankind  ;  all  are  born  to 
them,  so  all  are  equal.  Therefore,  what  the  State  pays  for, 
not  only  comes  at  the  cost  of  all,  but  must  be  for  the  use 
and  benefit  of  all.  Accordingly,  as  a  theocracy  demands 
the  education  of  priests,  and  an  aristocracy  that  of  the 
nobility  and  the  gentry,  so  a  democracy  demands  the  edu- 
cation of  all.  The  aim  must  be,  not  to  make  priests  and 
gentlemen  of  a  few,  a  privileged  class,  but  to  make  men  of 
all ;  that  is,  to  give  a  normal  and  healthy  development  of 
their  intellectual,  moral,  affectional  and  religious  faculties, 
to  furnish  and  instruct  them  with  the  most  important  ele- 
mentary knowledge,  to  extend  this  development  and  furnish- 
ing of  the  faculties  as  far  as  possible. 

Institutions  must  be  founded  for  this  purpose  — to  educate 
all,  rich  and  poor,  men  well-born  with  good  abilities,  men 
ill-born  with  slender  natural  powers.  In  New  England, 
these  institutions  have  long  since  been  founded  at  the  public 
cost,  and  watched  over  with  paternal  care,  as  the  ark  of 
our  covenant,  the  palladium  of  our  nation.  It  has  been 
recognized  as  a  theory,  and  practised  on  as  a  fact,  that  all 
the  property  in  the  land  is  held  by  the  State  for  the  public 
education  of  the  people,  as  it  is  for  their  defence ;  that 
property  is  amenable  to  education  as  to  military  defence. 

In  a  democracy  there  are  two  reasons  why  this  theory  and 
practice  prevail.  One  is  a  political  reason.  It  is  for  the 
advantage  of  the  State  ;  for  each  man  that  keeps  out  of  the 
jail  and  the  poor-house,  becomes  a  voter  at  one-and-twenty  ; 
he  may  have  some  office  of  trust  and  honor ;  the  highest 
office  is  open  before  him.  As  so  much  depends  on  his  vot- 
ing wisely,  he  must  have  a  chance  to  qualify  himself  for  his 
right  of  electing  and  of  being  elected.  It  is  as  necessary 
now  in  a  democracy,  and  as  much  demanded  by  the  idea 


OF    THE    PKOIT.K.  405 

thereof,  that  all  should  be  thus  qualified  by  education,  as  it 
once  was  in  a  military  State,  that  all  should  be  bred  up 
soldiers. 

The  other  is  a  philosophical  reason.  It  is  for  the  advan- 
tage of  the  individual  himself,  irrespective  of  the  State. 
The  man  is  a  man,  an  integer,  and  the  State  is  for  him ;  as 
well  as  a  fraction  of  the  State,  and  he  for  it.  He  has  a  man's 
rights ;  and,  however  inferior  in  might  to  any  other  man, 
born  of  parentage  how  humble  soever,  to  no  wealth  at  all, 
with  a  body  never  so  feeble,  he  is  yet  a  man,  and  so  equal 
in  rights  to  any  other  man  born  of  a  famous  line,  rich  and 
able  ;  of  course  he  has  a  right  to  a  chance  for  the  best  cul- 
ture which  the  educational  attainment  of  mankind,  and  the 
circumstances  of  the  nation  render  possible  to  any  man ;  to 
so  much  thereof  as  he  has  the  inborn  power  and  the  volun- 
tary industry  to  acquire.  This  conclusion  is  getting  acted 
on  in  New  England,  and  there  are  schools  for  the  dumb  and 
the  blind,  even  for  the  idiot  and  the  convict. 

So,  then,  as  the  idea  of  our  government  demands  the 
education  of  all,  the  amount  of  education  must  depend  on 
the  same  three  variables  mentioned  before ;  it  must  be  as 
good  as  it  is  possible  for  them  to  afford.  The  democratic 
State  has  never  done  its  political  and  educational  duty,  until 
it  affords  every  man  a  chance  to  obtain  the  greatest  amount 
of  education  which  the  attainment  of  mankind  renders  it 
possible  for  the  nation,  in  its  aclual  circumstances,  to  com- 
mand, and  the  man's  nature  and  disposition  render  it  possi- 
ble for  him  to  take. 

Looking  at  the  matter  politically,  from  the  point  of  view 
of  the  State,  each  man  must  have  education  enough  to  exer- 
cise his  rights  of  electing  and  being  elected.  It  is  not  easy 
to  fix  the  limits  of  the  amount ;  it  is  also  a  variable  continu- 
ally increasing.  Looking  at  the  matter  philosophically, 
from  the  point  of  view  of  the  individual,  there  is  .no  limit 
but  the  attainment  of  the  race  and  the  individual's  capacity 
for  development  and  growth.  Only  a  few  men  will  master 


400  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

all,  which  the  circumstances  of  the  nation  and  the  world 
render  attainable  ;  some  will  come  short  for  lack  of  power, 
others  for  lack  of  inclination.  Make  education  as  accessi- 
ble as  it  can  now  be  made,  as  attractive  as  the  teachers  of 
this  age  can  render  it,  the  majority  will  still  get  along  with 
the  smallest  amount  that  is  possible  or  reputable.  Only  a 
few  will  strive  for  the  most  they  can  get.  There  will  be 
many  a  thousand  farmers,  traders,  and  mechanics  in  their 
various  callings,  manual  and  intellectual,  to  a  single  philoso- 
pher. This  also  is  as  it  should  be,  and  corresponds  with  the 
nature  of  man  and  his  function  on  the  earth.  Still  all  have 
the  natural  right  to  the  means  of  education  to  this  extent, 
by  fulfilling  its  condition. 

To  accomplish  this  work,  the  democratic  education  of  the 
whole  people,  with  the  aim  of  making  them  men,  we  want 
public  institutions  founded  by  the  people,  paid  for  by  the 
public  money ;  institutions  well  endowed,  well  attended, 
watched  "over  well,  and  proportfonably  honored ;  we  want 
teachers,  able  men,  well  disciplined,  well  paid,  and  honored 
in  proportion  to  their  work.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  educate 
the  privileged  classes,  priests  in  a  theocracy,  and  gentlemen 
in  an  aristocracy.  Though  they  are  few  in  number,  it  is  a 
great  work ;  the  servants  thereof  are  not  too  well  paid,  nor 
too  much  held  in  esteem  in  England,  nor  in  Rome,  nor  too 
well  furnished  with  apparatus.  But  the  public  education  of 
a  whole  people  is  a  greater  work,  far  more  difficult,  and 
should  be  attended  with  corresponding  honor,  and  watched 
over  even  more  carefully  by  the  State. 

After  the  grown  men  of  any  country  have  provided  for 
their  own  physical  wants,  and  insured  the  needful  physical 
comforts,  their  most  important  business  is  to  educate  them- 
selves still  further,  and  train  up  the  rising  generation  to  their 
own  level.  It  is  important  to  leave  behind  us  cultivated 
lands,  houses  and  shops,  railroads  and  mills,  but  more  im- 
portant to  leave  behind  us  men  grown,  men  that  are  men  ; 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  407 

such  are  the  seed  of  material  wealth,  —  not  it  of  them.  The 
highest  use  of  material  wealth  is  its  educational  function. 

Now  the  attainments  of  the  human  race  increase  with 
each  generation  ;  the  four  leading  nations  of  Christendom, 
England,  France,  Germany,  and  the  United  States,  within 
a  hundred  years,  have  apparently,  at  the  least,  doubled  their 
spiritual  attainments ;  in  the  free  States  of  America,  there 
is  a  constant  and  rapid  increase  of  wealth,  far  beyond  the 
simultaneous  increase  of  numbers,  so  not  only  does  the  edu- 
cational achievement  of  mankind  become  greater  each  age, 
but  the  power  of  the  State  to  afford  each  man  a  better 
chance  for  a  better  education,  greatens  continually,  the  edu- 
cational ability  of  the  State  enlarging  as  those  two  factors 
get  augmented.  The  generation  now  grown  up,  is,  there- 
fore, able  and  bound  to  get  a  better  culture  than  their  fathers, 
and  leave  to  their  own  children  a  chance  still  greater. 

Each  child  of  genius,  in  the  nineteenth  century,  is  bom 
at  the  foot  of  the  ladder  of  learning,  as  completely  as  the 
first  child,  with  the  same  bodily  and  spiritual  nakedness  ; 
though  of  the  most  civilized  race,  with  six,  or  sixty  thousands 
of  years  behind  him,  he  must  begin  with  nothing  but  him- 
self. Yet  such  is  the  union  of  all  mankind,  that,  with  the 
aid  of  the  present  generation,  in  a  few  years  he  will  learn 
*ril  that  mankind  has  learned  in  its  long  history;  next  go 
beyond  that,  discovering  and  creating  anew  ;  and  then  draw 
up  to  the  same  height  the  new  generation  which  will  pre- 
sently surpass  him. 

A  man's  education  never  ends,  but  there  are  two  periods 
thereof,  quite  dissimilar,  the  period  of  the  Boy,  and  that  of 
the  Man.  Education  in  general  is  the  developing  and  in- 
structing of  the  faculties,  and  is,  therefore,  the  same  in  kind 
to  both  man  and  boy,  though  it  may  be  brought  about  by 
different  forces.  The  education  of  the  boy,  so  far  as  it  de- 
pends on  institutions,  and  conscious  modes  of  action,  must 
be  so  modified  as  to  enable  him  to  meet  the  influences  which 


408  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

will  surround  him  when  he  is  a  man ;  otherwise,  his  training 
will  not  enable  him  to  cope  with  the  new  forces  he  meets, 
and  so  will  fail  of  the  end  of  making  him  a  man.  I  pass 
over  the  influence  of  the  family,  and  of  nature,  which  do 
not  belong  to  my  present  theme.  In  America,  the  public 
education  of  men  is  chiefly  influenced  by  four  great  powers, 
which  I  will  call  educational  forces,  and  which  correspond 
to  four  modes  of  national  activity  : 

I.  The  political  action  of  the  people,  represented  by  the 
State  ; 

II.  The  industrial  action  of  the  people,  represented  by 
Business ; 

III.  The  ecclesiastical  action  of  the  people,  represented 
by  the  Church  ; 

IV.  The  literary  action  of  the  people,  represented  by  the 
Press. 

I  now  purposely  name  them  in  this  order,  though  I  shall 
presently  refer  to  them  several  times,  and  in  a  different 
succession.  These  forces  act  on  the  people,  making  us 
such  men  as  we  are ;  they  act  indirectly  on  the  child  before 
he  comes  to  consciousness ;  directly,  afterwards,  but  most 
powerfully  on  the  man.  What  is  commonly  and  technically 
called  education  —  the  development  and  instruction  of  the 
faculties  of  children,  is  only  preparatory ;  the  scholastic 
education  of  the  boy  is  but  introductory  to  the  practical 
education  of  the  man.  It  is  only  this  preparatory  education 
of  the  children  of  the  people  that  is  the  work  of  the 
school-masters.  Their  business  is  to  give  the  child  such 
a  development  of  his  faculties,  and  such  furniture  of  pre- 
liminary knowledge,  that  he  can  secure  the  influence  of  all 
these  educational  forces,  appreciating  and  enhancing  the 
good,  withstanding,  counteracting  and  at  last  ending  the  evil 
thereof,  and  so  continue  his  education  ;  and  at  the  same  time 
that  he  can  work  in  one  or  more  of  those  modes  of  activity, 
serving  himself  and  mankind,  politically  by  the  State,  eccle- 
siastically by  the  church,  literarily  by  the  press,  or  at  any 


OK    THE    PEOPLE.  409 

rate,  industrially  by  his  business.  To  give  children  the 
preparatory  education  necessary  for  this  fourfold  receptivity, 
or  activity,  we  need  three  classes  of  public  institutions  : 

I.  Free  common  schools  ; 

II.  Free  high  schools  ; 

III.  Free  colleges. 

Of  these  I  will  presently  speak  in  detail,  but  now,  for  the 
sake  of  shortness,  let  me  call  them  all  collectively  by  their 
generic  name  —  the  School.  It  is  plain  the  teachers  who 
work  by  this  instrument  ought  to  understand  the  good  and 
evil  of  the  four  educational  forces  which  work  on  men 
grown,  in  order  to  prepare  their  pupils  to  receive  the  good 
thereof,  and  withstand  the  evil.  So  then  let  us  look  a 
moment  at  the  character  of  these  educational  forces,  and 
see  what  they  offer  us,  and  what  men  they  are  likely  to 
make  of  their  unconscious  pupils.  Let  us  look  at  the  good 
qualities  first,  and  next  at  the  evil. 

It  is  plain  that  business,  the  press,  and  politics  all  tend  to 
promote  a  great  activity  of  body  and  mind.  In  business,  the 
love  of  gain,  the  enterprising  spirit  of  our  pi"actical  men  in 
all  departments,  their  industry,  thrift  and  forecast,  stimulate 
men  to  great  exertions,  and  produce  a  consequent  develop- 
ment of  the  faculties  called  out.  Social  distinction  depends 
almost  wholly  on  wealth  ;  that  never  is  accumulated  by 
mere  manual  industry,  such  is  the  present  constitution  of 
society,  but  it  is  acquired  by  the  higher  forms  of  industry, 
in  which  the  powers  of  nature  serve  the  man,  or  he  avails 
himself  of  the  creations  of  mere  manual  toil.  Hence  there 
is  a  constant  pressure  towards  the  higher  modes  of  industiy 
for  the  sake  of  money ;  of  course,  a  constant  effort  to  be 
qualified  for  them.  So  in  the  industrial  departments  the 
mind  is  more  active  than  the  hand.  Accordingly  it  has 
come  to  pass  that  most  of  the  brute  labor  of  the  free  States 
is  done  by  cattle,  or  by  the  forces  of  nature  —  wind,  water, 
fire  —  which  we  have  harnessed  by  our  machinery,  and  set 
to  work.  In  New  England  most  of  the  remaining  work 
35 


410  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

which  requires  little  intelligence  is  done  by  Irishmen,  who 
are  getting  a  better  culture  by  that  very  work.  Men  see  the 
industrial  handiwork  of  the  North,  and  wonder ;  they  do  not 
always  see  the  industrial  head-work,  which  precedes,  directs 
and  causes  it  all ;  they  seldom  see  the  complex  forces  of 
which  this  enterprise  and  progress  are  the  resultant. 

There  is  no  danger  that  we  shall  be  sluggards.  Business 
now  takes  the  same  place  in  the  education  of  the  people  that 
was  once  held  by  war :  it  stimulates  activity,  promotes  the 
intercourse  of  man  with  man,  nation  with  nation ;  assembling 
men  in  masses,  it  elevates  their  temperature,  so  to  say  ;  it 
leads  to  new  and  better  forms  of  organization ;  it  excites 
men  to  invention,  so  that  thereby  we  are  continually  ac- 
quiring new  power  over  the  elements,  peacefully  annexing 
to  our  domain  new  provinces  of  nature  —  water,  wind,  fire, 
lightning  —  setting  them  to  do  our  work,  multiplying  the 
comforts  of  life,  and  setting  free  a  great  amount  of  human 
time.  It  is  not  at  all  destructive ;  not  merely  conservative, 
but  continually  creates  anew.  Its  creative  agent  is  not  brute 
force,  but  educated  mind.  A  man's  trade  is  always  his 
teacher,  and  industry  keeps  a  college  for  mankind,  much  of 
our  instruction  coming  through  our  hands  ;  with  us,  where 
the  plough  is  commonly  in  the  hands  of  him  who  owns  the 
land  it  furrows,  business  affords  a  better  education  than  in 
most  other  countries,  and  develops  higher  qualities  of  mind. 
There  is  a  marked  difference  in  this  respect  between  the 
North  and  South.  There  was  never  before  such  industry, 
such  intense  activity  of  head  and  hand  in  any  nation  in  a 
time  of  peace. 

The  press  encourages  the  same  activity,  enterprise,  per- 
severance. Both  of  these  encourage  generosity ;  neither 
honors  the  miser,  who  gets  for  the  sake  of  getting,  or 
•"  starves,  cheats,  and  pilfers  to  enrich  an  heir ;"  he  does  not 
die  respectably  in  Boston,  who  dies  rich  and  bequeaths 
nothing  to  any  noble  public  charity.  It  encourages  industry 


OF    THE    PEOPI.K.  411 

which  accumulates  with  the  usual  honesty,  and  for  a  rather 
generous  Use. 

The  press  furnishes  us  with  books  exceedingly  cheap. 
We  manufacture  literature  cheaper  than  any  nation  except 
the  Chinese.  Even  the  best  books,  the  works  of  the  great 
masters  of  thought,  are  within  the  reach  of  an  industrious 
farmer  or  mechanic,  if  half  a  dozen  families  combine  for 
the  purpose.  The  educational  power  of  a  few  good  books 
scattered  through  a  community,  is  well  known. 

Then  the  press  circulates,  cheap  and  wide,  its  newspapers, 
emphatically  the  literature  of  men  who  read  nothing  else : 
they  convey  intelligence  from  all  parts  of  the  world,  and 
broaden  the  minds  of  home-keeping  youths,  who  need  not 
now  have  homely  wits. 

The  State,  also,  promotes  activity,  enterprise,  hardihood, 
perseverance  and  thrift.  The  American  Government  is 
eminently  distinguished  by  these  five  qualities.  The  form 
of  government  stimulates  patriotism,  each  man  has  a  share 
in  the  public  lot.  The  theocracies,  monarchies,  and  aristoc- 
racies of  old  time  have  produced  good  and  great  examples 
of  patriotism,  in  the  few  or  the  many ;  but  the  nobler  forms 
of  love  of  country,  of  self-denial  and  disinterested  zeal  for 
its  sake,  are  left  for  a  democracy  to  bring  to  light. 

Here  all  men  are  voters,  and  all  great  questions  are, 
apparently  and  in  theory,  left  to  the  decision  of  the  whole 
people.  This  popular  form  of  government  is  a  great  instru- 
ment in  developing  and  instructing  the  mind  of  die  nation. 
It  helps  extend  and  intensify  the  intelligent  activity  which  is 
excited  by  business  and  the  press.  Such  is  the  nature  of  our 
political  institutions  that,  in  the  free  States,  we  have  pro- 
duced the  greatest  degree  of  national  unity  of  action,  with 
the  smallest  restriction  of  personal  freedom,  have  reconciled 
national  unity  with  individual  variety,  not  seeking  uniformity ; 
thus  room  is  left  for  as  much  individualism  as  a.  man  chooses 
to  take ;  a  vast  power  of  talent,  enterprise  and  invention  is  left 
free  for  its  own  work.  Elsewhere,  save  in  England,  this  is 


412  PUBMC    EDUCATION 

latent,  kept  down  by  government.  Since  this  power  is 
educated  and  has  nothing  to  hold  it  back  ;  since  so  much 
brute  work  is  done  by  cattle  and  the  forces  of  nature,  now 
domesticated  and  put  in  harness,  and  much  time  is  left  free 
for  thought,  more  intelligence  is  demanded,  more  activity, 
and  the  citizens  of  the  free  States  have  become  the  most 
active,  enterprising  and  industrious  people  in  the  world  ;  the 
most  inventive  in  material  work. 

In  all  these  three  forms  of  action  there  is  much  to  stir 
men  to  love  of  distinction.  The  career  is  open  to  talent,  to 
industry  ;  open  to  every  man  ;  the  career  of  letters,  business, 
and  politics.  Our  rich  men  were  poor  men ;  our  famous 
men  came  of  sires  else  not  heard  of.  The  laurel,  the 
dollar,  the  office  and  the  consequent  social  distinction  of 
men  successful  in  letters,  business  and  politics,  these  excite 
the  obscure  or  needy  youth  to  great  exertions,  and  he  cannot 
sleep ;  emulation  wakes  him  early,  and  keeps  him  late  astir. 
Behind  him,  scattering  "  the  rear  of  darkness,'1  stalk  poverty 
and  famine,  gaunt  and  ugly  forms,  with  scorpion  whip  to 
urge  the  tardier,  idler  man.  The  intense  ambition  for 
money,  for  political  power,  and  the  social  results  they  bring, 
keeps  men  on  the  alert.  So  ambition  rises  early,  and  works 
with  diligence  that  never  tires. 

The  Church,  embracing  all  the  churches  under  that 
name,  cultivates  the  memory  of  men,  and  teaches  rever- 
ence for  the  past;  it  helps  keep  activity  from  wandering 
into  unpopular  forms  of  wickedness  or  of  unbelief.  Men 
who  have  the  average  intelligence,  goodness  and,  piety,  it 
keeps  from  slipping  back,  thus  blocking  to  rearward  the 
wheels  of  society,  so  that  the  ascent  gained  shall  not  be  lost ; 
men  who  have  less  than  this  average  it  urges  forward^ 
addressing  them  in  the  name  of  God,  encouraging  by  hope 
of  heaven,  and  driving  with  fear  of  hell.  It  turns  the  thought 
of  the  people  towards  God  ;  it  sets  before  us  some  facts  in 
the  life,  and  some  parts  of  the  doctrine  of  the  noblest  One 
who  ever  wore  the  form  of  man,  bidding  us  worship  him. 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  413 

The  ecclesiastical  worship  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth  is,  perhaps, 
the  best  thing  in  the  American  church.  It  has  the  Sunday 
and  the  institution  of  preaching  under  its  control.  A  body 
of  disciplined  men  are  its  servants  ;  they  praise  the  ordinary 
virtues ;  oppose  and  condemn  the  unpopular  forms  of  error 
and  of  sin.  Petty  vice,  the  vice  of  low  men,  in  low  places, 
is  sure  of  their  lash.  They  promote  patriotism  in  its  com- 
mon form.  Indirectly,  they  excite  social  and  industrial 
rivalry,  and  favor  the  love  of  money  by  the  honor  they 
bestow  upon  the  rich  and  successful.  But  at  the  same  time 
they  temper  it  a  little,  sometimes  telling  men,  as  business  or 
the  State  does  not,  that  there  is  in  man  a  conscience,  affection 
for  his  brother-man,  and  a  soul  which  cannot  live  by  bread 
alone  ;  no,  not  by  wealth,  office,  fame  and  social  rank.  They 
tell  us,  also,  of  eternity,  where  worldly  distinctions,  except  of 
orthodox  and  heterodox,  are  forgotten,  where  wealth  is  of  no 
avail ;  they  bid  us  remember  God. 

Such  are  the  good  things  of  these  great  national  forces ; 
the  good  things  which  in  this  fourfold  way  we  are  teaching 
ourselves.  The  nation  is  a  monitorial  school,  wonderfully 
contrived  for  the  education  of  the  people.  I  do  not  mean  to 
say  that  it  is  by  the  forethought  of  men  that  the  American 
democracy  is  at  the  same  time  a  great  practical  school  for 
the  education  of  the  human  race.  This  result  formed  no 
part  of  our  plan,  and  is  not  provided  for  by  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States ;  it  comes  of  the  forethought  of  God, 
and  is  provided  for  in  the  Constitution  of  the  Universe. 

Now  each  of  these  educational  forces  has  certain  defects, 
negative  evils,  and  certain  vices,  positive  evils,  which  tend 
to  misdirect  the  nation,  and  so  hinder  the  general  education 
of  the  people  :  of  these,  also,  let  me  speak  in  detail. 

The  State  appeals  to  force,  not  to  justice  ;  this  is  its  last 
appeal ;  the  force  of  muscles  aided  by  force  of  mind,  instruct- 
ed by  modern  science  in  the  art  to  kill.  The  nation  appeals 
to  force  in  the  settlement  of  affairs  out  of  its  borders.  We 
have  lately  seen  an  example  of  this,  when  we  commenced 
35« 


414  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

war  against  a  feeble  nation,  who,  in  that  special  emergency, 
had  right  on  her  side,  about  as  emphatically  as  the  force 
was  on  our  side.  The  immediate  success  of  the  enterprise, 
the  popular  distinction  acquired  by  some  of  the  leaders,  the 
high  honor  bestowed  on  one  of  its  heroes,  all  this  makes  the 
lesson  of  injustice  attractive.  It  may  be  that  a  similar  ex- 
periment will  again  be  tried,  and  doubtless  with  like  success. 
Certainly  there  is  no  nation  this  side  of  the  water  which  can 
withstand  the  enterprise,  the  activity,  the  invention,  industry 
and  perseverance  of  a  people  so  united,  and  yet  so  free  and 
intelligent.  Another  successful  injustice  of  this  character, 
on  a  large  scale,  will  make  right  still  less  regarded,  and 
might  honored  yet  more. 

The  force  we  employ  out  of  our  borders,  might  opposed 
to  right,  we  employ  also  at  home  against  our  brethren,  and 
keep  three  millions  of  them  in  bondage ;  we  watch  for  op- 
portunities to  extend  the  institution  of  slavery  over  soil  un- 
polluted by  that  triple  curse,  and  convert  the  Constitution, 
J;he  fundamental  law  of  the  land,  into  an  instrument  for  the 
defence  of  slavery. 

The  men  we  honor  politically,  by  choosing  them  to  offi- 
ces in  the  State,  are  commonly  men  of  extraordinary  force, 
sometimes,  it  is  true,  only  of  extraordinary  luck,  but  of  only 
ordinary  justice  ;  men  who,  perhaps,  have  mind  in  the  heroic 
degree,  but  conscience  of  the  most  vulgar  pattern.  They 
are  to  keep  the  law  of  the  United  States  when  it  is  wholly 
hostile  to  the  law  of  the  universe,  to  the  everlasting  justice 
of  God. 

I  am  not  speaking  to  politicians,  professional  representa- 
tives of  the  State  ;  not  speaking  for  political  effect ;  not  of 
the  State  as  a  political  machine  for  the  government  of  the 
people.  I  am  speaking  to  teachers,  for  an  educational  pur- 
pose ;  of  the  State  as  an  educational  machine,  as  one  of  the 
great  forces  for  the  spiritual  development  of  the  people. 
Now  by  this  preference  of  force  and  postponement  of  justice 
at  home  and  abroad,  in  the  selection  of  men  for  office,  with 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  415 

its  wealth,  and  rank,  and  honor,  by  keeping  the  law  of  the 
land  to  the  violation  of  the  law  of  God,  it  is  plain  we  are 
teaching  ourselves  to  love  wrong;  at  least  to  be  insensible 
to  the  right.  What  we  practise  on  a  national  scale  as  a 
people,  it  is  not  easy  to  think  wrong  when  practised  on  a 
personal  scale,  by  this  man  and  that. 

The  patriotism,  also,  which  the  State  nurses,  is  little  more 
than  that  Old  Testament  patriotism  which  loves  your  coun- 
tryman, and  hates  the  stranger ;  the  affection  which  the  Old 
Testament  attributes  to  Jehovah,  and  which  makes  him  say, 
"I  loved  Jacob,  and  I  hated  Esau;"  a  patriotism  which 
supports  our  country  in  the  wrong  as  readily  as  in  the  right, 
and  is  glad  to  keep  one  sixth  part  of  the  nation  in  bondage 
without  hope.  It  is  not  a  patriotism  which,  beginning  here, 
loves  all  the  children  of  God,  but  one  that  robs  the  Mexican, 
enslaves  the  African,  and  exterminates  the  Indian. 

These  are  among  the  greater  evils  taught  us  by  the  polit- 
ical action  of  the  people  as  a  whole.  If  you  look  at  the 
action  of  the  chief  political  parties,  you  see  no  more  respect 
for  justice  in  the  politics  of  either  party,  than  in  the  politics 
of  the  nation,  the  resultant  of  both ;  no  more  respect  for 
right  abroad,  or  at  home.  One  party  aims  distinctively  at 
preserving. the  property  already  acquired  ;  its  chief  concern 
is  for  that,  its  sympathy  there  ;  where  its  treasure  is,  is  also 
its  heart.  It  legislates,  consciously  or  otherwise,  more  for 
accumulated  wealth,  than  for  the  laboring  man  who  now 
accumulates.  This  party  goes  for  the  dollar ;  the  other  for 
the  majority,  and  aims  at  the  greatest  good  of  the  greatest 
number,  leaving  the  good  of  the  smaller  number  to  most 
uncertain  mercies.  Neither  party  seems  to  aim  at  justice, 
which  protects  both  the  wealth  that  labor  has  piled  up,  and 
the  laborer  who  now  creates  it ;  justice,  which  is  the  point 
of  morals  common  to  man  and  God,  where  the  interests  of 
all  men,  abroad  and  at  home,  electing  and  elected,  greatest 
number  and  smallest  number,  exactly  balance.  Falsehood, 
fraud,  a  willingness  to  deceive,  a  desire  for  the  power  and 


416  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

distinction  of  office,  a  readiness  to  use  base  means  in  obtain- 
ing office  —  these  vices  are  sown  with  a  pretty  even  hand 
upon  both  parties,  and  spring  up  with  such  blossoms  and 
such  a  fruitage  as  we  all  see.  The  third  political  party  has 
not  been  long  enough  in  existence  to  develop  any  distinctive 
vices  of  its  own. 

I  shall  not  speak  of  the  public  or  private  character  of  the 
politicians  who  direct  the  State ;  no  doubt  that  is  a  powerful 
element  in  our  national  education  ;  but  as  a  class,  they 
seem  no  better  and  no  worse  than  merchants,  mechanics, 
ministers  and  farmers,  as  a  class ;  so  in  their  influence 
there  is  nothing  peculiar,  only  their  personal  character 
ceases  to  be  private,  and  becomes  a  public  force  in  the  edu- 
cation of  the  people. 

The  Churches  have  the  same  faults  as  the  State.  There 
is  the  same  postponement  of  justice  and  preference  of  force, 
the  same  neglect  of  the  law  of  God  in  their  zeal  for  the 
statutes  of  men ;  the  same  crouching  to  dollars  or  to  num- 
bers. However,  in  the  churches  these  faults  appear  nega- 
tively, rather  than  as  an  affirmation.  The  worldliness  of 
the  church  is  not  open,  self-conscious  and  avowed  ;  it  is 
not,  as'  a  general  thing,  that  human  injustice  is  openly 
defended,  but  rather  justice  goes  by  default.  But  if  the 
churches  do  not  positively  support  and  teach  injustice,  as 
the  State  certainly  does,  they  do  not  teach  the  opposite, 
and,  so  far  as  that  goes,  are  allies  of  the  State  in  its  evil 
influence.  The  fact  that  the  churches,  as  such,  did  not 
oppose  the  war,  and  do  not  oppose  slavery,  its  continuance, 
or  its  extension  ;  nay,  that  they  are  often  found  its  apologists 
and  defenders,  seldom  its  opponents ;  that  they  not  only 
pervert  the  sacred  books  of  the  Christians  to  its  defence,  but 
wrest  the  doctrines  of  Christianity  to  justify  it ;  the  fact  that 
they  cannot,  certainly  do  not,  correct  the  particularism  of 
the  political  parties,  the  love  of  wealth  in  one,  of  mere 
majorities  in  the  other  ;  that  they  know  no  patriotism  not 


OP    THK    PEOPLK.  41? 

bounded  by  their  country,  none  coextensive  with  mankind  ; 
that  they  cannot  resist  the  vice  of  party  spirit  —  these  are 
real  proofs  that  the  church  is  but  the  ally  of  the  State  in  this 
evil  influence. 

But  the  church  has  also  certain  specific  faults  of  its  own. 
It  teaches  injustice  by  continually  referring  to  the  might  of 
God,  not  His  justice  ;  to  His  ability  and  will  to  damn  man- 
kind,  not  asking  if  He  has  the  right  ?  It  teaches  that  in 
virtue  of  His  infinite  power,  He  is  not  amenable  to  infinite 
justice,  and  to  infinite  love.  Thus,  while  the  State  teaches, 
in  the  name  of  expediency  and  by  practice,  that  the  strong 
may  properly  be  the  tyrants  of  the  weak,  the  mighty  nation 
over  the  feeble,  the  strong  race  over  the  inferior,  that  the 
government  may  dispense  with  right  at  home  and  abroad  — 
the  church,  as  theory  and  in  Christ's  name,  teaches  that  God 
may  repudiate  His  own  justice  and  His  own  love. 

The  churches  have  little  love  of  truth,  as  such,  only  of 
its  uses.  It  must  be  such  a  truth  as  they  can  use  for  their 
purposes  ;  canonized  truth  ;  truth  long  known  ;  that  alone  is 
acceptable  and  called  "  religious  truth ;  "  all  else  is  "  pro- 
fane and  carnal,"  as  the  reason  which  discovers  it.  They 
represent  the  average  intelligence  of  society  ;  hence,  while 
keeping  the  old,  they  welcome  not  the  new.  They  promote 
only  popular  forms  of  truth,  popular  in  all  Christendom,  or 
in  their  special  sect.  They  lead  in  no  intellectual  reforms ; 
they  hinder  the  leaders.  Negatively  and  positively,  they 
teach,  that  to  believe  what  is  clerically  told  you  in  the  name 
of  religion,  is  better  than  free,  impartial  search  after  the 
truth.  They  dishonor  free  thinking,  and  venerate  con- 
strained believing.  When  the  clergy  doubt,  they  seldom 
give  men  audience  of  their  doubt.  Few  scientific  men  not 
clerical  believe  the  Bible  account  of  creation,  —  the  uni- 
verse made  in  six  days,  and  but  a  few  thousand  years  ago, 
—  or  that  of  the  formation  of  woman,  and  of  the  deluge. 
Some  clerical  men  still  believe  these  venerable  traditions, 
spite  of  the  science  of  the  times  ;  but  the  clerical  men  who 


418 


PUBLIC    EDUCATION 


have  no  faith  in  these  stories  not  only  leave  the  people  to 
think  them  true  and  miraculously  taught,  but  encourage 
men  in  the  belief,  and  calumniate  the  men  of  science  who 
look  the  universe  fairly  in  the  face  and  report  the  facts  as 
they  find  them. 

The  church  represents  only  the  popular  morality,  not  any 
high  and  aboriginal  virtue.  It  represents  not  the  conscience 
of  human  nature,  reflecting  the  universal  and  unchangea- 
ble moVal  laws  of  God,  touched  and  beautified  by  his  love, 
but  only  the  conscience  of  human  history,  reflecting  the 
circumstances  man  has  passed  by,  and  the  institutions  he 
has  built  along  the  stream  of  time.  So,  while  it  denounces 
unpopular  sins,  vices  below  the  average  vice  of  society,  it 
denounces  also  unpopular  excellence,  which  is  above  the 
average  virtue  of  society.  It  blocks  the  wheels  rearward, 
and  the  car  of  humanity  does  not  roll  down  hill ;  but  it 
blocks  them  forward  also.  No  great  moral  movement  of 
the  age  is  at  all  dependent  directly  on  the  church  for  its 
birth ;  very  little  for  its  development.  It  is  in  spite  of  the 
church  that  reforms  go  forward  ;  it  holds  the  curb  to  check 
more  than  the  rein  to  guide.  In  morals,  as  in  science,  the 
church  is  on  the  anti-liberal  side,  afraid  of  progress,  against 
movement,  loving  "  yet  a  little  sleep,  a  little  slumber ; " 
conservative  and  chilling,  like  ice,  not  creative,  nor  even 
quickening,  as  water.  It  doffs  to  use  and  wont ;  has  small 
confidence  in  human  nature,  much  in  a  few  facts  of  human 
history.  It  aims  to  separate  Piety  from  Goodness,  her  nat* 
ural  and  heaven-appointed  spouse,  and  marry  her  to  Bigotry, 
in  joyless  and  unprofitable  wedlock.  The  church  does  not 
lead  men  to  the  deep  springs  of  human  nature,  fed  ever 
from  the  far  heights  of  the  Divine  nature,  whence  flows  that 
river  of  God,  full  of  living  water,  where  weary  souls  may 
drink  perennial  supply.  While  it  keeps  us  from  falling 
back,  it  does  little  directly  to  advance  mankind.  In  common 
with  the  State,  this  priest  and  Levite  pass  by  on  the  other 
side  of  the  least  developed  classes  of  society,  leaving  the 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  419 

slave,  the  pauper,  and  the  criminal,  to  their  fate,  hastening 
to  strike  hands  with  the  thriving  or  the  rich. 

These  faults  are  shared  in  the  main  by  all  sects ;  some 
have  them  in  the  common,  and  some  in  a  more  eminent 
degree,  but  none  is  so  distinguished  from  the  rest  as  to  need 
emphatic  rebuke,  or  to  deserve  a  special  exemption  from  the 
charge.  Such  are  the  faults  of  the  church  of  every  land, 
and  must  be  from  the  nature  of  the  institution ;  like  the 
State,  it  can  only  represent  the  average  of  mankind. 

I  am  not  speaking  to  clergymen,  professional  representa- 
tives of  the  church,  not  of  the  church  as  an  ecclesiastical 
machine  for  keeping  and  extending  certain  opinions  and 
symbols ;  not  for  an  ecclesiastical  purpose ;  I  speak  to 
teachers,  for  an  educational  purpose,  of  the  church  as  an 
educational  machine,  one  of  the  great  forces  for  the  spirit- 
ual development  of  the.  people. 

The  Business  of  the  land  has  also  certain  vices  of  its 
own ;  while  it  promotes  the  virtues  I  have  named  before,  it 
does  not  tend  to  promote  the  highest  form  of  character.  It 
does  not  promote  justice  and  humanity,  as  one  could  wish ; 
it  does  not  lead  the  employer  to  help  the  operative  as  a  man, 
only  to  use  him  as  a  tool,  merely  for  industrial  purposes. 
The  average  merchant  cares  little  whether  his  ship  brings 
cloth  and  cotton,  or  opium  and  rum.  The  average  capitalist 
does  not  wish  the  stock  of  his  manufacturing  company 
divided  into  small  shares,  so  that  the  operatives  can  invest 
their  savings  therein  and  have  a  portion  of  the  large  divi- 
dends of  the  rich ;  nor  does  he  care  whether  he  takes  a 
mortgage  on  a  ship  or  a  negro  slave,  nor  whether  his  houses 
are  rented  for  sober  dwellings,  or  for  drunkeries ;  whether 
the  State  hires  his  money  to  build  harbors  at  home,  or  de- 
stroy them  abroad.  The  ordinary  manufacturer  is  as  ready 
to  make  cannons  and  cannon-balls  to  serve  in  a  war  which 
he  knows  is  unjust,  as  to  cast  his  iron  into  mill-wheels,  or 
forge  it  into  anchors.  The  common  farmer  does  not  care 

D 


420  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

whether  his  barley  feeds  poultry  for  the  table,  or,  made  into 
beer,  breeds  drunkards  for  the  almshouse  and  the  jail  ;  asks 
not  whether  his  rye  and  potatoes  become  the  bread  of  life, 
or,  distilled  into  whiskey,  are  deadly  poison  to  men  and 
women.  He  cares  little  if  the  man  he  hires  become  more 
manly  or  not ;  he  only  asks  him  to  be  a  good  tool.  Whips 
for  the  backs  of  negro  slaves  are  made,  it  is  said,  in  Con- 
necticut with  as  little  compunction  as  Bibles  are  printed 
there  ;  "  made  to  order/'  for  the  same  purpose  —  for  the 
dollar.  The  majority  of  blacksmiths  would  as  soon  forge 
fetter-chains  to  enslave  the  innocent  limbs  of  a  brother-man, 
as  draught-chains  for  oxen.  Christian  mechanics  and  pious 
young  women,  who  would  not  hurt  the  hair  of  an  innocent 
head,  have  I  seen  at  Springfield,  making  swords  to  slaughter 
the  innocent  citizens  of  Vera  Cruz  and  Jalapa.  The  ships 
of  respectable  men  carry  rum  to  intoxicate  the  savages  of 
Africa,  powder  and  balls  to  shoot  them  with  ;  they  carry 
Opium  to  the  Chinese  ;  nay,  Christian  slaves  from  Richmond 
and  Baltimore  to  New  Orleans  and  Galveston.  In  all  com- 
mercial countries,  the  average  vice  of  the  age  is  mixed  up 
with  the  industry  of  the  age,  and  unconsciously  men  learn 
the  wickedness  long  intrenched  in  practical  life.  It  is 
thought  industrial  operations  are  not  amenable  to  the  moral 
law,  only  to  the  law  of  trade.  "  Let  the  supply  follow  the 
demand  "  is  the  maxim.  A  man  who  makes  as  practical  a 
use  of  the  golden  rule  as  of  his  yard-stick,  is  still  an  excep- 
tion in  all  departments  of  business. 

Even  in  the  commercial  and  manufacturing  parts  of 
America,  money  accumulates  in  large  masses  ;  now  in  the 
hands  of  an  individual,  now  of  a  corporation.  This  money 
becomes  an  irresponsible  power,  acting  by  the  laws,  but  yet 
above  them.  It  is  wielded  by  a  few  men,  to  whom  it  gives 
a  high  social  position  and  consequent  political  power.  They 
use  this  triple  form  of  influence,  pecuniary,  social  and 
political,  in  the  spirit  of  commerce,  not  of  humanity,  not  for 
the  interest  of  mankind  ;  thus  the  spirit  of  trade  comes  into 


OF   THE    PEOPJLE.  421 

the  State.  Hence  it  is  not  thought  wrong  in  politics  to  buy 
a  man,  more  than  in  commerce  to  buy  a  ship ;  hence  the 
rights  of  a  man,  or  a  nation,  are  looked  on  as  articles  of 
trade,  to  be  sold,  bartered  and  pledged  ;  and  in  the  Senate 
of  the  United  States,  we  have  heard  a  mass  of  men,  more 
numerous  than  all  our  citizens  seventy  years  ago,  estimated 
as  worth  twelve  hundred  millions  of  dollars. 

In  most  countries  business  comes  more  closely  into  con- 
tact with  men  than  the  State,  or  the  church,  or  the  press,  and 
is  a  more  potent  educator.  Here  it  not  only  does  this,  but 
controls  the  other  three  forces,  which  are  mainly  instruments 
of  this  ;  hence  this  form  of  evil  is  more  dangerous  than  else- 
where, for  there  is  no  power  organized  to  resist  it  as  in  Eng- 
land or  Rome  ;  so  it  subtly  penetrates  every  where,  bidding 
you  place  the  accidents  before  the  substance  of  manhood,  and 
value  money  more  than  man. 

Notwithstanding  the  good  qualities  of  the  Press,  the  books 
it  multiplies,  and  the  great  service  it  renders,  it  also  has  cer- 
tain vices  of  its  own.  From  the  nature  of  the  thing  the 
greater  part  of  literature  represents  only  the  public  opinion 
of  the  time.  It  must  therefore  teach  deference  to  that,  not 
deference  to  truth  and  justice.  It  is  only  the  eminent  litera- 
ture which  can  do  more  than  this  ;  books,  which  at  first  fall 
into  few  hands  though  fit,  and  like  the  acorns  sown  with  the 
mulleins  and  the  clover,  destined  to  germinate  but  slowly, 
long  to  be  over-topped  by  an  ephemeral  crop,  at  last,  after 
half  an  hundred  years,  shall  mature  their  own  fruit  for  other 
generations  of  men.  The  current  literature  of  this  age  only 
popularizes  the  thought  of  the  eminent  literature  of  the  past. 
Great  good  certainly  comes  from  this,  but  also  great  evil. 

Of  all  literature,  the  newspapers  come  most  into  contact 
with  men  —  they  are  the  literature  of  the  people,  read  by 
such  as  read  nothing  else ;  read  also  by  such  as  read  all 
things  beside.  Taken  in  the  mass,  they  contain  little  to  ele- 
vate men  above  the  present  standard.  The  political  journals 
36 


422  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

have  the  general  vice  of  our  politics,  and  the  special  faults 
of  the  particular  pairty ;  the  theological  journals  have  the 
common  failings  of  the  church,  intensified  by  the  bigotry  of 
the  sects  they  belong  to  ;  the  commercial  journals  represent 
the  bad  qualities  of  business.  Put  all  three  together,  and  it 
is  not  their  aim  to  tell  the  truth,  the  whole  truth,  and  noth- 
ing but  the  truth,  nor  to  promote  justice,  the  whole  of  justice, 
and  nothing  but  justice.  The  popular  literature  helps  bring 
to  consciousness  the  sentiments  and  ideas  which-  prevail  in 
the  State,  the  church,  and  business.  It  brings  those  senti- 
ments and  ideas  intimately  into  connection  with  men,  mag- 
netizing them  with  the  good  and  ill  of  those  three  powers, 
but  it  does  little  directly  to  promote  a  higher  form  of  human 
character. 

So,  notwithstanding  the  good  influence  of  these  four 
modes  of  national  activity  in  educating  the  grown  men  of 
America,  they  yet  do  not  afford  the  highest  teaching  which 
the  people  require,  to  realize  individually  the  idea  of  a  man, 
and  jointly  that  of  a  democracy.  The  State  does  not  teach 
perfect  justice  ;  the  church  does  not  teach  that,  or  love  of 
truth.  Business  does  not  teach  perfect  morality,  and  the 
average  literature,  which  falls  into  the  hands  of  the  million, 
teaches  men  to  respect  public  opinion  more  than  the  word 
of  God,  which  transcends  that.  Thus  these  four  teach  only 
the  excellence  already  organized  or  incorporated  in  the  laws, 
the  theology,  the  customs,  and  the  books  of  the  land.  I  can- 
not but  think  these  four  teachers  are  less  deficient  here  than 
in  other  lands,  and  have  excellencies  of  their  own,  but 
the  faults  mentioned  are  inseparable  from  such  institutions. 
An  institution  is  an  organized  thought ;  of  course,  no  insti- 
tution can  represent  a  truth  which  is  too  new  or  too  high  for 
the  existing  organizations,  yet  that  is  the  truth  which  it  is 
desirable  to  teach.  So  there  will  always  be  exceptional 
men,  with  more  justice,  truth  and  love  than  is  represented 
by  the  institutions  of  the  time,  who  seem  therefore  hostile 
to  these  institutions,  which  they  seek  to  improve  and  not 


OF    THE    PKOPLE.  423 

destroy.  Contemporary  with  the  priests  of  Judah  and  Israel 
were  the  prophets  thereof,  antithetic  to  one  another  as  the 
centripetal  and  centrifugal  forces,  but,  like  them,  both 
necessary  to  the  rhythmic  movement  of  the  orbs  in  heaven, 
and  the  even  poise  of  the  world. 

In  Rome  and  in  England  the  idea  of  a  theocracy  and  an 
aristocracy  has  become  a  fact  in  the  institutions  of  the  land, 
which  accordingly  favor  the  formation  of  priests  and  gen- 
tlemen. The  teachers  of  the  educated  class,  therefore,  may 
trust  to  the  machinery  already  established  to  do  their  work, 
only  keeping  off  the  spirit  of  the  age  which  would  make  in- 
novations ;  and  such  is  the  respectability  and  popular  esteem 
of  the  institutions,  that  this  is  done  easier  than  men  think, 
by  putting  an  exceptional  book  in  the  index  at  Rome  or  in 
the  academical  fire  at  Oxford.  But  here,  the  idea  of  a  de- 
mocracy is  by  no  means  so  well  established  and  organized 
in  institutions.  It  is  new,  and  while  a  theocrat  and  an  aris- 
tocrat are  respected  every  where,  a  democrat  is  held  in  sus- 
picion ;  accordingly,  to  make  men,  the  teacher  cannot  trust 
his  educational  machinery,  he  must  make  it,  and  invent 
anew  as  well  as  turn  his  mill. 

These  things  being  so,  it  is  plain  the  teachers  in  the 
schools  should  be  of  such  a  character  that  they  can  give  the 
children  what  they  will  most  want  when  they  become  men  ; 
such  an  intellectual  and  moral  development  that  they  can 
appreciate  and  receive  the  good  influence  of  these  four  edu- 
cational forces,  and  withstand,  resist,  and  exterminate  the 
evil  thereof.  In  the  schools  of  a  democracy  which  are  to 
educate  the  people  and  make  them  men,  you  need  more 
aboriginal  virtue  than  in  the  schools  of  an  aristocracy  or  a 
theocracy,  where  a  few  are  to  be  educated  as  gentlemen  or 
priests.  Since  the  institutions  of  the  land  do  not  represent 
the  idea  of  a  democracy,  and  the  average  spirit  of  the 
people,  which  makes  the  institutions,  represents  it  no  more, 
if  the  children  of  the  people  are  to  become  better  than  their 


424  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

fathers,  it  is  plain  their  teachers  must  be  prophets,  and  not 
priests  merely ;  must  animate  them  with  a  spirit  higher, 
purer  and  more  holy  than  that  which  inspires  .the  State,  the 
church,  business,  or  the  common  literature  of  the  times.  As 
the  teacher  cannot  impart  and  teach  what  he  does  not  pos- 
sess and  know,  it  is  also  plain  that  the  teacher  must  have 
this  superior  spirit. 

To  accomplish  the  public  education  of  the  children  of  the 
people,  we  need  the  three  classes  of  institutions  just  men- 
tioned :  free  Common  Schools,  free  High  Schools  and  free 
Colleges.  Let  me  say  a  word  of  each. 

The  design  of  the  Common  School  is  to  take  children  at 
the  proper  age  from  their  mothers,  and  give  them  the  most 
indispensable  development,  intellectual,  moral,  affectional 
and  religious ;  to  furnish  them  with  as  much  positive,  useful 
knowledge  as  they  can  master,  and,  at  the  same  time,  teach 
them  the  three  great  scholastic  helps  or  tools  of  education  — 
the  art  to  read,  to  write  and  calculate. 

The  children  of  most  parents  are  easily  brought  to  school, 
by  a  little  diligence  on  the  part  of  the  teachers  and  school 
committee  ;  but  there  are  also  children  of  low  and  abandoned, 
or,  at  least,  neglected  parents,  who  live  in  a  state  of  con- 
tinual truancy  ;  they  are  found  on  the  banks  of  your  canals ; 
they  swarm  in  your  large  cities.  When  those  children 
become  men,  through  lack  of  previous  development,  instruc- 
tion and  familiarity  with  these  three  instruments  of  educa- 
tion, they  cannot  receive  the  full  educational  influence  of 
the  State  and  Church,  of  business  and  the  press :  they  lost 
their  youthful  education,  and  therefore  they  lose,  in  conse- 
quence, their  manly  culture.  They  remain  dwarfs,  and  are 
barbarians  in  the  midst  of  society  ;  there  will  be  exceptional 
men  whom  nothing  can  make  vulgar ;  but  this  will  be  the 
lot  of  the  mass.  They  cannot  perform  the  intelligent  labor 
which  business  demands,  only  the  brute  work,  so  they  lose 
the  development  which  comes  through  the  hand  that  is  ac- 


OK    THE    PEOPLE.  425 

tive  in  the  higher  modes  of  industry,  which,  after  all,  is  the 
greatest  educational  force  ;  accordingly,  they  cannot  com- 
pete  with  ordinary  men,  and  remain  poor ;  lacking  also  that 
self-respect  which  comes  of  being  respected,  they  fall  into 
beggary,  into  intemperance,  into  crime  ;  so,  from  being 
idlers  at  first,  a  stumbling-block  in  the  way  of  society,  they 
become  paupers,  a  positive  burthen  which  society  must  take 
on  its  shoulders ;  or  they  turn  into  criminals,  active  foes  to 
the  industry,  the  order,  and  the  virtue  of  society. 

Now  if  a  man  abandons  the  body  of  his  child,  the  State 
adopts  that  body  for  a  time  ;  takes  the  guardianship  thereof, 
for  the  child's  own  sake ;  sees  that  it  is  housed,  fed,  clad, 
and  cared  for.  If  a  man  abandons  his  child's  spirit,  and 
the  child  commits  a  crime,  the  State,  for  its  own  sake,  as- 
sumes the  temporary  guardianship  thereof,  and  puts  him  in 
a  jail.  When  a  man  deserts  his  child,  taking  no  concern 
about  his  education,  I  venture  to  make  the  suggestion, 
whether  it  would  not  be  well,  as  a  last  resort,  for  the  State 
to  assume  the  guardianship  of  the  child  for  its  own  sake, 
and  for  the  child's  sake.  We  allow  no  one,  with  ever  so 
thick  a  skin,  to  grow  up  in  nakedness ;  why  should  we  suffer 
a  child,  with  however  so  perverse  a  parent,  to  grow  up  in 
ignorance  and  degenerate  into  crime  ?  Certainly,  a  naked 
man  is  not  so  dangerous  to  society  as  an  ignorant  man,  nor 
is  the  spectacle  so  revolting.  I  should  have  less  hope  of  a 
State  where  the  majority  were  so  perverse  as  to  continue 
ignorant  of  reading,  writing  and  calculating,  than  of  one 
where  they  were  so  thick-skinned  as  to  wear  no  clothes.  In 
Massachusetts,  there  is  an  Asylum  for  juvenile  offenders, 
established  by  the  city  of  Boston,  a  Farm  School  for  bad 
boys,  established  by  the  characteristic  benevolence  of  the 
rich  men  of  that  place,  and  a  State  Reform  School  under 
the  charge  of  the  Commonwealth  :  all  these  are  for  lads 
who  break  the  laws  of  the  land.  Would  it  not  be  better  to 
take  one  step  more,  adopt  them  before  they  offended,  and 
allow  no  child  to  grow  up  in  the  barbarism  of  ignorance  ? 
36* 


426  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

Has  any  man  an  unalienable  right  to  live  a  savage  in  the 
midst  of  civilization  ? 

We  need  also  public  High  Schools,  to  take  children  where 
the  common  schools  leave  them,  and  carry  them  further  on. 
Some  States  have  done  something  towards  establishing  such 
institutions ;  they  are  common  in  New  England.  Some 
have  established  Normal  Schools,  special  High  Schools  for 
the  particular  and  professional  education  of  public  teachers. 
Without  these,  it  is  plain  there  would  not  be  a  supply  of 
competent  educators  for  the  public  service. 

Then  we  need  free  Colleges,  conducted  by  public  officers, 
and  paid  for  by  the  public  purse.  Without  these  the  scheme 
is  not  perfect.  The  idea  which  lies  at  the  basis  of  the  pub- 
lic education  of  a  people  in  a  democracy,  is  this :  Every 
man,  on  condition  of  doing  his  duty,  has  a  right  to  the 
means  of  education,  as  much  as  a  right,  on  the  same  condi- 
tion, to  the  means  of  defence  from  a  public  enemy  in  time 
of  war,  or  from  starvation  in  time  of  plenty  and  of  peace. 
I  say  every  man,  I  mean  every  woman  also.  The  amount 
of  education  must  depend  on  the  three  factors  named  be- 
fore,— on  the  general  achievement  of  mankind,  the  special 
ability  of  the  State,  and  the  particular  power  of  the  indi- 
vidual. 

If  all  is  free,  common  schools,  high  schools,  and  colleges, 
boys  and  girls  of  common  ability  and  common  love  of  learn- 
ing, will  get  a  common  education  ;  those  of  greater  ability, 
a  more  extended  education,  and  those  of  the  highest  powers, 
the  best  culture  which  the  race  can  now  furnish,  and  the 
State  afford.  Hitherto  no  nation  has  established  a  public 
college,  wholly  at  the  public  cost,  where  the  children  of  the 
poor  and  the  rich  could  enjoy  together  the  great  national 
charity  of  superior  education.  To  do  this  is  certainly  not 
consistent  with  the  idea  of  a  theocracy  or  an  aristocracy, 
but  it  is  indispensable  to  the  complete  realization  of  a  de- 
mocracy. Otherwise  the  children  of  the  rich  will  have  a 
monopoly  of  superior  education,  which  is  the  case  with  the 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  427 

girls  every  where  —  for  only  the  daughters  of  rich  men  can 
get  a  superior  education,  even  in  the  United  States  —  and 
with  boys  in  England  and  France,  and  of  course  the  offices, 
emoluments  and  honors  which  depend  on  a  superior  educa- 
tion ;  or  else  the  means  thereof  will  be  provided  for  poor 
lads  by  private  benefactions,  charity-funds  and  the  like, 
which  some  pious  and  noble  man  has  devoted  to  this  work. 
In  this  case  the  institutions  will  have  a  sectarian  character, 
be  managed  by  narrow,  bigoted  men,  and  the  gift  of  the 
means  of  education  be  coupled  with  conditions  which  must 
diminish  its  value,  and  fetter  the  free  spirit  of  the  young 
man.  This  takes  place  in  many  of  the  collegiate  establish- 
ments of  the  North,  which,  notwithstanding  those  defects, 
have  done  a  great  good  to  mankind. 

The  Common  Schools  giving  their  pupil  the  power  of 
reading,  writing  and  calculating,  developing  his  faculties 
and  furnishing  him  with  much  elementary  knowledge,  put 
him  in  communication  with  all  that  is  written  in  a  common 
form,  in  the  English  tongue  ;  its  treasures  lie  level  to  his 
eye  and  hand.  The  High  School  and  the  College,  teaching 
him  also  other  languages,  afford  him  access  to  the  treas- 
ures contained  there;  teaching  him  the  mathematics  and 
furnishing  him  with  the  discipline  of  science,  they  enable 
him  to  understand  all  that  has  hitherto  been  recorded  in  the 
compendious  forms  of  philosophy,  and  thus  place  the  child 
of  large  ability  in  connection  with  all  the  spiritual  treasures 
of  the  world.  In  the  mean  time,  for  all  these  pupils,  there 
is  the  material  and  the  human  world  about  them,  the  world 
of  consciousness  within.  They  can  study  both  aad  add 
what  they  may  to  the  treasures  of  human  discovery  or 
invention. 

It  seems  to  me  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  State  to  place 
the  means  of  this  education  within  the  reach  of  all  children 
of  superior  ability,  —  a  duty  that  follows  from  the  very  idea 
of  a  democracy,  not  to  speak  of  the  idea  of  Christianity. 
It  is  not  less  the  interest  of  the  State  to  do  so,  for  then, 


428  rVKlAC    KDUCATION 


youths,  well  born,  with  good  abilities,  will  not  be  hindered 
from  getting  a  breeding  proportionate  to  their  birth,  and 
from  occupying  the  stations  which  are  adequately  filled  only 
by  men  of  superior  native  abilities,  enriched  by  culture,  and 
developed  to  their  highest  power.  Then  the  work  of  such 
stations  will  fall  to  the  lot  of  such  men,  and  of  course  be 
done.  Eminent  ability,  talent,  or  genius,  should  have  emi- 
nent education,  and  so  serve  the  nation  in  its  eminent  kind  ; 
for  when  God  makes  a  million-minded  man,  as  once  or 
twice  in  the  ages,  or  a  myriad-minded  man,  as  He  does  now 
and  then,  it  is  plain  that  this  gift  also  is  to  be  accounted 
precious,  and  used  for  the  advantage  of  all. 

I  say  no  State  has  ever  attempted  to  establish  such  insti- 
tutions ;  yet  the  Government  of  the  United  States  has  a 
seminary  for  the  public  education  of  a  few  men  at  the  public 
cost.  But  it  is  a  school  to  qualify  men  to  fight  ;  they  learn 
the  science  of  destruction,  the  art  thereof,  the  kindred  art 
and  science  of  defence.  If  the  same  money  we  now  pay 
for  military  education  at  West  Point  were  directed  to  the 
education  of  teachers  of  the  highest  class,  say  professors 
and  presidents  of  colleges  ;  if  the  same  pains  were  taken  to 
procure  able  men,  to  furnish  them  with  the  proper  instruc- 
'  tion  for  their  special  work,  and  give  them  the  best  possible 
general  development  of  their  powers,  not  forgetting  the 
moral,  the  affectional  and  the  religious,  and  animating  them 
with  the  philanthropic  spirit  needed  for  such  a  work,  how 
much  better  results  would  appear  !  But  in  the  present  intel- 
lectual condition  of  the  people  it  would  be  thought  unworthy 
of  a  nation  to  train  up  school-masters  !  But  is  it  only  soldiers 
that  we  need  ? 

All  these  institutions  are  but  introductory,  a  preparatory 
school,  in  three  departments,  to  fit  youths  for  the  great  edu- 
cational establishment  of  practical  life.  This  will  find  each 
youth  and  maiden  as  the  schools  leave  him,  moulding  him 
to  their  image,  or  moulded  by  him  to  a  better.  So  it  is 
plain  what  the  teachers  are  to  do  :  —  besides  teaching  the 


OP   THE    PEOPLE. 

special  branches  which  fall  to  their  lot,  they  are  to  supply 
for  the  pupil,  the  defects  of  the  State,  of  the  Church,  of 
Business,  and  the  Press,  especially  the  moral  defects.  For 
this  great  work  of  mediating  between  the  mother  and  the 
world,  for  so  furnishing  and  fitting  the  rising  generation, 
introducing  them  into  practical  life,  that  they  shall  receive 
all  the  good  of  these  public  educational  forces  with  none 
of  the  ill,  but  enhance  the  one  while  they  withstand  the 
other,  and  so  each  in  himself  realize  the  idea  of  man,  and 
all  in  their  social  capacity,  the  idea  of  a  democracy  —  it  is 
also  plain  what  sort  of  men  we  need  for  teachers  :  we  need 
able  men,  well  endowed  by  nature,  well  disciplined  by  art ; 
we  need  superior  men  —  men  juster  than  the  State,  truer 
and  better  than  the  churches,  more  humane  than  business, 
and  higher  than  the  common  literature  of  the  press.  There 
are  always  men  of  that  stamp  born  into  the  world ;  enough 
of  them  in  any  age  to  do  its  work.  How  shall  we  bring 
them  to  the  task  ?  Give  young  men  and  women  the  oppor- 
tunity to  fit  themselves  for  the  work,  at  free  common 
schools,  high  schools,  normal  schools,  and  colleges ;  give  them 
a  pay  corresponding  to  their  services,  as  in  England  and 
Rome  ;  give  them  social  rank  and  honor  in  that  proportion, 
and  they  will  come ;  able  men  will  come ;  men  well  disci- 
plined will  come ;  men  of  talent  and  even  genius  for  educa- 
tion will  come. 

In  the  State  you  pay  a  man  of  great  political  talents 
large  money  and  large  honors ;  hence  there  is  no  lack  of 
ability  in  politics,  none  of  competition  for  office.  In  the 
church  you  pay  a  good  deal  for  a  "smart  minister,"  one 
who  can  preach  an  audience  into  the  pews  and  not  himself 
out  of  the  pulpit.  Talent  enough  goes  to  business  ;  edu- 
cated talent  too,  at  least  with  a  special  education  for  this, 
honor,  and  social  distinction.  Private  colleges  and  theolog- 
ical schools,  often,  have  powerful  men  for  their  professors 
and  presidents  ;  sometimes,  men  of  much  talent  for  educa- 
tion ;  commonly,  men  of  ripe  learning  and  gentlemanly 


430  IM'IJLIC     KDUCATIOV 

accomplishments.  Even  men  of  genius  seek  a  place  as 
teachers  in  some  private  college,  where  they  are  under  the 
control  of  the  leaders  of  a  sect  —  and  must  not  doubt  its 
creed,  nor  set  science  a-going  freely  lest  it  run  over  some 
impotent  theological  dogma  —  or  else  of  a  litttle  coterie,  or 
close  corporation  of  men  selected  because  radical  or  because 
conservative,  men  chosen  not  on  account  of  any  special  fit- 
ness for  superintending  the  superior  education  of  the  people, 
but  because  they  were  one-sided,  and  leaned  this  way  in 
Massachusetts  and  that  in  Virginia.  Able  men  seek  such 
places  because  they  get  a  competent  pay,  competent  honors, 
competent  social  rank.  Senators  and  ambassadors  are  not 
ashamed  to  be  presidents  of  a  college,  and  submit  to  the 
control  of  a  coterie,  or  a  sect,  and  produce  their  results.  If 
such  men  can  be  had  for  private  establishments  to  educate  a 
few  to  work  in  such  trammels  and  such  company,  certainly, 
it  is  not  difficult  to  get  them  for  the  public  and  for  the 
education  of  all.  As  the  State  has  the  most  children  to 
educate,  the  most  money  to  pay  with,  it  is  clear,  not  only 
that  they  need  the  best  ability  for  this  work,  but  that  they 
can  have  it  soon  as  they  make  the  teacher's  calling  gainful 
and  respectable. 

In  England  and, Rome,  the  most  important  spiritual  func- 
tion of  the  State  is  the  production  of  the  gentleman  and  the 
priest;  in  democratic  America  it  is  the  production  of  the  man. 
Some  nations  have  taken  pains  with  the  military  training  of 
all  the  people,  for  the  sake  of  the  State,  and  made  every 
man  a  soldier.  No  nation  has  hitherto  taken  equivalent 
pains  with  the  general  education  of  all,  for  the  sake  of  the 
State  and  the  sake  of  the  citizens;  —  "the  heathens  of 
China  "  have  done  more  than  any  Christian  people,  for  the 
education  of  all.  This  was  not  needed  in  a  theocracy,  nor 
an  aristocracy  ;  it  is  essential  to  a  democracy.  This  is 
needed  politically  ;  for  where  all  men  are  voters,  the  ignorant 
man,  who  cannot  read  the  ballot  which  he  casts  ;  the  thief, 
the  pirate,  and  the  murderer,  may,  at  any  time,  turn  the 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  431 

scale  of  an  election,  and  do  us  a  damage  which  it  will  take 
centuries  to  repair.  Ignorant  men  are  the  tools  of  the  de- 
magogue ;  how  often  he  uses  them,  and  for  what  purposes, 
we  need  not  go  back  many  years  to  learn.  Let  the  people 
be  ignorant-  and  suffrage  universal,  a  very  few  men  will 
control  the  State,  and  laugh  at  the  folly  of  the  applauding 
multitude  whose  bread  they  waste,  and  on  whose  necks  they 
ride  to  insolence  and  miserable  fame. 

America  has  nothing  to  fear  from  any  foreign  foe  ;  for 
nearly  forty  years  she  has  had  no  quarrel  but  of  her  own 
making.  Such  is  our  enterprise  and  our  strength,  that  few 
nations  would,  carelessly,  engage  in  war  with  us  ;  none, 
without  great  provocation.  In  the  midst  of  us,  is  our  danger; 
not  in  foreign  arms,  but  in  the  ignorance  and  the  wicked- 
ness of  our  own  children,  the  ignorance  of  the  many,  the 
wickedness  of  the  few  who  will  lead  the  many  to  their  ruin. 
The  bulwark  of  America  is  not  the  army  and  navy  of  the 
United  States,  with  all  the  men  at  public  cost  instructed  in 
the  art  of  war  ;  it  is  not  the  swords  and  muskets  idly 
bristling  in  our  armories  ;  it  is  not  the  cannon  and  the  powder 
carefully  laid  by  ;  no,  nor  is  it  yet  the  forts,  which  frown  in 
all  their  grim  barbarity  of  stone  along  the  coast,  defacing 
the  landscape,  else  so  fair  :  these  might  all  be  destroyed  to- 
nitrht,  and  the  nation  be  as  safe  as  now.  The  more  effectual 

O         * 

bulwark  of  America  is  her  schools.  The  cheap  spelling- 
book,  or  the  vane  on  her  school-house  is  a  better  symbol  of 
the  nation  than  "  The  star-spangled  banner  ;  "  the  printing 
press  does  more  than  the  cannon  ;  the  press  is  mightier  than 
the  sword.  The  army  that  is  to  keep  our  liberties  —  you 
are  part  of  that,  the  noble  army  of  teachers.  It  is  you, 
who  are  to  make  a  great  nation  greater,  even  wise  and 
good,  —the  next  generation  better  than  their  sires. 
3  Europe  shows  us,  by  experiment,  that  a  republic  cannot 
be  made  by  a  few  well-minded  men,  however  well-meaning. 
They  tried  for  it  at  Rome,  full  of  enlightened  priests;  in 
Germany,  the  paradise  of  the  scholar,  but  there  was  not  a 


432  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

people  well  educated,  and  a  democracy  could  not  stand  up- 
right long  enough  to  be  set  a-going.  In  France,  where  men 
are  better  fitted  for  the  experiment  than  elsewhere  in  con- 
tinental Europe,  you  see  what  comes  of  it  —  the  first  step 
is  a  stumble,  and  for  their  president,  the  raw  republicans 
chose  an  autocrat,  not  a  democrat ;  not  a  mere  soldier,  but 
only  the  name  of  a  soldier ;  one  that  thinks  it  an  insult  if 
liberty,  equality,  and  fraternity  be  but  named  ! 

Think  you  a  democracy  can  stand  without  the  education 
of  all ;  not  barely*  the  smallest  pittance  thereof  which  will 
keep  a  live  soul  in  a  live  body,  but  a  large,  generous  culti- 
vation of  mind  and  conscience,  heart  and  soul  ?  A  man, 
with  half  an  eye,  can  see  how  we  suffer  continually  in 
politics  for  lack  of  education  among  the  people.  Some 
nations  are  priest-ridden,  some  king-ridden,  some  ridden  of 
nobles  ;  America  is  ridden  by  politicians,  a  heavy  burthen 
for  a  foolish  neck. 

Our  industrial  interests  demand  the  same  education.  The 
industrial  prosperity  of  the  North,  our  lands  yearly  enriching, 
while  they  bear  their  annual  crop;  our  railroads,  mills  and 
machines,  the  harness  with  which  we  tackle  the  elements, 
—  for  we  domesticate  fire  and  water,  yes,  the  very  lightning 
of  heaven  —  all  these  are  but  material  results  of  the  intelli- 
gence of  the  people.  Our  political  success  and  our  indus- 
trial prosperity,  both  come  from  the  pains  taken  with  the 
education  of  the  people.  Halve  this  education,  and  you 
take  away  three  fourths  of  our  political  welfare,  three 
fourths  of  our  industrial  prosperity  ;  double  this  education, 
you  greaten  the  political  welfare  of  the  people,  you  increase 
their  industrial  success  fourfold.  Yes,  more  than  that,  for 
the  results  of  education  increase  by  a  ratio  of  much  higher 
powers. 

It  seems  strange  that  so  few  of  the  great  men  in  politics 
have  cared  much  for  the  education  of  the  people ;  only  one 
of  those,  now  prominent  before  the  North,  is  intimately  con- 
nected with  it.  He,  at  great  personal  sacrifice  of  money, 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  433 

of  comfort,  of  health,  even  of  respectability,  became  superin- 
tendent of  the  common  schools  of  Massachusetts,  a  place 
whence  we  could  ill  spare  him,  to  take  the  place  of  the 
famous  man  he  succeeds.  Few  of  the  prominent  scholars 
of  the  land  interest  themselves  in  the  public  education  of 
the  people.  The  men  of  superior  culture  think  the  com- 
mon school  beneath  their  notice  ;  but  it  is  the  mother  of 
them  all. 

None  of  the  States  of  the  North  has  ever  given  this 
matter  the  attention  it  demands.  When  we  legislate  about 
public  education,  this  is  the  question  before  us  :  —  Shall  we 
give  our  posterity  the  greatest  blessing  that  one  generation 
can  bestow  upon  another  ?  Shall  we  give  them  a  personal 
power  which  will  create  wealth  in  every  form,  multiply 
ships,  and  roads  of  earth,  or  of  iron  ;  subdue  the  forest,  till 
the  field,  chain  the  rivers,  hold  the  winds  as  its  vassals,  bind 
with  an  iron  yoke  the  fire  and  water,  and  catch  and  tame 
the  lightning  of  God  ?  Shall  we  give  them  a  personal 
power  which  will  make  them  sober,  temperate,  healthy  and 
wise  ;  that  shall  keep  them  at  peace,  abroad  and  at  home, 
organize  them  so  wisely  that  all  shall  be  united,  and  yet, 
each  left  free,  with  no  tyranny  of  the  few  over  the  many,  or 
the  little  over  the  great  ?  Shall  we  enable  them  to  keep,  to 
improve,  to  double  manifold  the  political,  social  and  personal 
blessings  they  now  possess  ;  shall  we  give  them  this  power 
to  create  riches,  to  promote  order,  peace,  happiness  —  all 
forms  of  human  welfare,  or  shall  we  not  ?  That  is  the 
question.  Give  us  intelligent  men,  moral  men,  men  well 
developed  in  mind  and  conscience,  heart  and  soul,  men  that 
love  man  and  God,  industrial  prosperity,  social  prosperity, 
and  political  prosperity,  are  sure  to  follow.  But  without 
such  men,  all  the  machinery  of  this  threefold  prosperity  is 
but  a  bauble  in  a  child's  hand,  which  he  will  soon  break  or 
lose,  which  he  cannot  replace  when  gone,  nor  use  while 
kept. 

Rich   men,   who   have   intelligence   and   goodness,  will 
37 


434  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

educate  their  children,  at  whatever  cost.  There  are  some 
men,  even  poor  men's  sons,  born  with  such  native  power 
that  they  will  achieve  an  education,  often  a  most  masterly 
culture ;  men  whom  no  poverty  can  degrade,  or  make 
vulgar,  whom  no  lack  of  means  of  culture  can  keep  from 
being  wise  and  great.  Such  are  exceptional  men ;  the 
majority,  nine  tenths  of  the  people,  will  depend,  for  their 
culture,  on  the  public  institutions  of  the  land.  If  there  had 
never  been  a  free  public  school  in  New  England,  not  half 
of  her  mechanics  and  farmers  would  now  be  able  to  read, 
not  a  fourth  part  of  her  women.  I  need  not  stop  to  tell 
what  would  be  the  condition  of  her  agriculture,  her  manu- 
factures, her  commerce ;  they  would  have  been,  perhaps, 
even  behind  the  agriculture,  commerce  and  manufactures  of 
South  Carolina.  I  need  not  ask  what  would  be  the  condition 
of  her  free  churches,  or  the  republican  institutions  which 
now  beautify  her  rugged  shores  and  sterile  soil ;  there  would 
be  no  such  churches,  no  such  institutions.  If  there  had 
been  no  such  schools  in  New  England,  the  Revolution  would 
yet  remain  to  be  fought.  Take  away  the  free  schools,  you 
take  away  the  cause  of  our  manifold  prosperity  ;  double 
their  efficiency  and  value,  you  not  only  double  and  quadru- 
ple the  prosperity  of  the  people,  but  you  will  enlarge  their 
welfare  —  political,  social,  personal  —  far  more  than  I  now 
dare  to  calculate.  I  know  men  object  to  public  schools  ; 
they  say  :  education  must  be  bottomed  on  religion,  and  that 
cannot  be  taught  unless  we  have  a  State  religion,  taught  "by 
authority"  in  all  our  schools;  we  cannot  teach  religion, 
without  teaching  it  in  a  sectarian  form.  This  objection  is 
getting  made  in  New  York  ;  we  have  got  beyond  it  in  New 
England.  It  is  true,  all  manly  education  must  be  bottomed 
on  religion ;  it  is  essential  to  the  normal  development  of 
man,  and  all  attempts  at  education,  without  this,  must  fail  of 
the  highest  end.  But  there  are  two  parts  of  religion  which 
can  be  taught  in  all  the  schools,  without  disturbing  the 
denominations,  or  trenching  upon  their  ground,  namely, 


OF    THE    PEOPLE.  435 

piety,  the  love  of  God,  and  goodness,  the  love  of  man. 
The  rest  of  religion,  after  piety  and  goodness  are  removed, 
may  safely  be  left  to  the  institutions  of  any  of  the  sects, 
and  so  the  State  will  not  occupy  their  ground. 

It  is  often  said  that  superior  education  is  not  much 
needed  ;  the  common  schools  are  enough,  aod  good  enough, 
for  it  is  thought  that  superior  education  is  needed  for  men  as 
lawyers,  ministers,  doctors,  and  the  like,  not  for  men  as 
men.  It  is  not  so.  We  want  men  cultivated  with  the  best  " 
discipline,  every  where,  not  for  the  profession's  sake,  but  for 
man's  sake.  Every  man  with  a  superior  culture,  intellectual, 
moral  and  religious,  every  woman  thus  developed,  is  a  safe- 
guard and  a  blessing.  He  may  sit  on  the  bench  of  a  judge 
or  a  shoemaker,  be  a  clergyman  or  an  oysterman,  that 
matters  little,  he  is  still  a  safeguard  and  a  blessing.  The 
idea  that  none  should  have  a  superior  education  but  pro- 
fessional men  —  they  only  for  the  profession's  sake  —  be- 
longs to  dark  ages,  and  is  unworthy  of  a  democracy. 

It  is  the  duty  of  all  men  to  watch  over  the  public  educa- 
tion of  the  people,  for  it  is  the  most  important  work  of  the 
State.     It  is  particularly  the  duty  of  men  who,  hitherto,  have 
least  attended  to  it,  men  of  the  highest  culture,  men,  too,  of 
the  highest  genius.    If  a  man  with  but  common  abilities  has 
attained  great  learning,  he  is  one  of  the  "  public  adminis- 
trators," to  distribute  the  goods  of  men  of  genius,  from  other 
times  and  lands,  to  mankind,  their  legal  heirs.     Why  does 
God  sometimes  endow  a  man  with  great  intellectual  power, 
making,  now  and  then,  a  million-minded   man?     Is  that 
superiority  of  gift  solely  for  the  man's  own  sake  ?     Shame 
on  such  a  thought.     It  is  of  little  value  to  him  unless  he  use 
it  for  me  ;  it  is  for  your  sake  and  my  sake,  more  than  for  his 
own.     He  is  a  precious  almoner  of  wisdom ;  one  of  the 
public  guardians  of  mankind,  to  think  for  us,  to  help  us  think 
for  ourselves  ;  born  to  educate  the  world  of  feebler  men. 
call  on  such  men,  men  of  culture,  men  of  genius,  to  help 


436  PUBLIC    EDUCATION 

build  up  institutions  for  the  education  of  the  people.  If  they 
neglect  this,  they  are  false  to  their  trust.  The  culture  which 
hinders  a  man  from  sympathy  with  the  ignorant,  is  a  curse 
to  both,  and  the  genius  which  separates  a  man  from  his 
fellow-creatures,  lowlier  born  than  he,  is  the  genius  of  a 
demon. 

Men  and  women,  practical  teachers  now  before  me,  a 
great  trust  is  in  your  hands ;  nine  tenths  of  the  children  of 
the  people  depend  on  you  for  their  early  culture,  for  all  the 
scholastic  discipline  they  will  ever  get ;  their  manly  culture 
will  depend  on  that,  their  prosperity  thereon,  all  these  on 
you.  When  they  are  men,  you  know  what  evils  they  will 
easily  learn  from  state  and  church,  from  business  and  the 
press.  It  is  for  you  to  give  them  such  a  developing  and 
such  a  furnishing  of  their  powers,  that  they  will  withstand, 
counteract  and  exterminate  that  evil.  Teach  them  to  love 
justice  better  than  their  native  land,  truth  better  than  their 
church,  humanity  more  than  money,  and  fidelity  to  their 
own  nature  better  than  the  public  opinion  of  the  press.  As 
the  chief  thing  of  all,  teach  them  to  love  man  and  God. 
Your  characters  will  be  the  inspiration  of  these  children ; 
your  prayers  their  practice,  your  faith  their  works. 

The  rising  generation  is  in  your  hands,  you  can  fashion 
them  in  your  image,  you  will,  you  must  do  this.  Great 
duties  will  devolve  on  these  children  when  grown  up  to  be 
men  ;  you  are  to  fit  them  for  these  duties.  Since  the 
Revolution,  there  has  not  been  a  question  before  the  country, 
not  a  question  of  constitution  or  confederacy,  free  trade  or 
protective  tariff,  sub-treasury  or  bank,  of  peace  or  war, 
freedom  or  slavery,  the  extension  of  liberty,  or  the  exten- 
sion of  bondage  —  not  a  question  of  this  sort  has  come  up 
before  Congress,  or  the  people,  which  could  not  have  been 
better  decided  by  seven  men,  honest,  intelligent  and  just, 
who  loved  man  and  God,  and  looked,  with  a  single  eye,  to 
what  was  right  in  the  case.  It  is  your  business  to  train  up 


OP    THE    PEOPLE.  437 

such  men.  A  representative,  a  senator,  a  governor  may  be 
made,  any  day,  by  a  vote.  Ballots  can  make  a  president 
out  of  almost  any  thing;  the  most  ordinary  material  is  not 
too  cheap  and  vulgar  for  that.  But  all  the  votes  of  all  the 
conventions,  all  the  parties,  are  unable  to  make  a  people 
capable  of  self-government.  They  cannot  put  intelligence 
and  justice  into  the  head  of  a  single  man.  You  are  to 
do  that.  You  are  the  "  Sacred  Legion,"  the  "  Theban 
Brothers"  to  repel  the  greatest  foes  that  can  invade  the 
land,  the  only  foes  to  be  feared;  you  are  to  repel  ignorance, 
injustice,  unmanliness,  and  irrellgion.  With  none  else  to 
help  you,  in  ten  years'  time  you  can  double  the  value  of 
your  schools ;  double  the  amount  of  development  and  in- 
struction you  annually  furnish.  So  doing,  you  shall  double, 
triple,  quadruple,  multiply  manifold  the  blessings  of  the 
land.  You  can,  if  you  will.  I  ask  If  you  will  ?  If  your 
works  say  "  Yes,"  then  you  will  be  the  great  benefactors  of 
the  land,  not  giving  money,  but  a  charity  far  nobler  yet, 
education,  the  greatest  charity.  You  will  help  fulfil  the 
prophecy  which  noble  men  long  since  predicted  of  mankind, 
and  help  found  the  kingdom  of  heaven  on  earth ;  you  will 
follow  the  steps  of  that  noblest  man  of  men,  the  Great 
Educator  of  the  human  race,  whom  the  Christians  still 
worship  as  their  God.  Yes,  you  will  work  with  God  himself; 
He  will  work  with  you,  work  for  you,  and  bless  you  with 
everlasting  life. 


37* 


APPENDIX 

NOTE  TO  p.  45. 


SOME  ACCOUNT  OF  THE  INSTALLATION  OF  MR.  PARKER. 

LETTER   OF    THE   COMMITTEE    TO   MR.   PARKER. 

Boston,  November  28,  1845. 
DEAR  SIR  :  — 

Among  your  friends  and  congregation  at  the  Melodeon,  a  Society 
has  been  organized  according  to  law  ;  and  we  have  been  instructed, 
as  the  Standing  Committee,  to  invite  you  to  become  its  Minister. 

It  gives  us  great  pleasure  to  be  the  means  to  forward,  in  this  small 
degree,  the  end  proposed,  and  we  cordially  extend  you  the  invitation, 
with  the  sincere  hope  that  it  will  meet  a  favorable  answer. 
We  are,  truly  and  respectfully, 

Your  friends,  MARK  HEALET, 

JOHN  FLINT, 
LEVI  B.  MERIAM. 
AMOS  COOLIDGE, 
JOHN  G.  KING, 
SIDNEY  HOMER, 
HENRY  SMITH, 
GEO.W.  ROBINSON, 
C.  M.  ELLIS. 
To  THE  REV.  THEODORE  PARKER, 

West  Rozbury,  Mass. 


MR.  PARKER'S  REPLY. 

To  MARK  HEALEY,  JOHN  FLINT,  LEVI  B.  MERIAM,  AMOS  COOLIDGE, 
JOHN  G.  KING,  SIDNEY  HOMER,  HENRY  SMITH,  GEORGE  W.  ROBIN- 
SON, AND  C.  M.  ELLIS,  ESQUIRES. 

DEAR  FRIENDS  : 
When  I  received  your  communication  of  the  28th  inst ,  I  did  not 


110  APPENDIX. 

hesitate  iu  my  decision,  but  I  have  delayed  giving  you  a  formal 
reply,  in  order  that  I  might  confer  with  my  friends  in  this  place, 
whom  it  becomes  my  painful  duty  to  leave.  -  I  accept  your  invita- 
tion;  but  wish  it  to  be  provided  that  our  connection  may  at  any 
time  be  dissolved,  by  either  party  giving  notice  to  the  other  of  a 
desire  to  that  effect,  six  months  before  such  a  separation  is  to  take 
place. 

It  is  now  nearly  a  year  since  I  began  to  preach  at  the  Melodeon. 
I  came  at  the  request  of  some  of  you ;  but  I  did  not  anticipate  the 
present  result.  Far  from  it.  I  thought  but  few  would  come  and 
listen  to  what  was  so  widely  denounced.  But  I  took  counsel  of  my 
hopes  and  not  of  my  fears.  It  seems  to  me  now  that,  if  we  are 
faithful  to  our  duty,  we  shall,  in  a  few  years  build  up  a  society  which 
shall  be  not  only  a  joy  to  our  own  hearts,  but  a  blessing  also  to 
others,  now  strangers  and  perhaps  hostile  to  us.  I  feel  that  we  have 
begun  a  good  work.  With  earnest  desires  for  the  success  of  our 
common  enterprise,  and  a  willingness  to  labor  for  the  advancement 
of  real  Christianity,  I  am, 

Faithfully,  your  friend, 

THEODORE  PARKER. 

West  Eoxbury,  12th  Dec.,  1845. 


On  Sunday,  January  4,  1846,  REV.  THEODORE  PARKER  was  install- 
ed as  Pastor  of  the  Twenty-eighth  Congregational  Society  in  Boston. 
The  exercises  on  the  occasion  were  as  follows  :  — 

INTRODUCTORY  HYMN. 

PRAYER. 
VOLUNTARY  ON  THE  ORGAN. 

The  Chairman  of  the  Standing  Committee  then  addressed  the 
Congregation  as  follows : 

By  the  instructions  of  the  Society,  the  Committee  have  made 
an  arrangement  with  Mr.  Parker,  by  which  the  services  of  this 
Society,  under  its  new  organization,  should  commence  with  the  new 
year ;  and  this  being  our  first  meeting,  it  has  been  set  apart  for 
such  introductory  services  as  may  seem,  fitting  for  our  position  and 
prospects. 

The  circumstances  under  which  this  Society  has  been  formed, 
and  its  progress  hitherto,  are  familiar  to  most  of  those  present.  It 
first  began  from  certain  influences  which  seemed  hostile  to  the 
of  religious  freedom.  It  wa?-  the  opinion  of  many  of  thopp 


APPENDIX.  441 

now  present,  that  a  minister  of  the  Gospel,  truly  worthy  of  that 
name,  was  proscribed  on  account  of  his  opinions,  branded  as  a  here- 
tic, and  shut  out  from  the  pulpits  of  this  city. 

At  a  meeting  of  gentlemen  held  January  2?,  1845,  the  following 
Resolution  was  passed  :  — 

"  Resolved,  That  the  Rev.  Theodore  Parker  shall  have  a  chance  to 
be  heard  in  Boston." 

To  carry  this  into  effect,  this  Hall  was  secured  for  a  place  of 
meeting,  and  the  numbers  who  have  met  here  from  Sunday  to  Sun- 
day, have  fully  answered  our  most  sanguine  expectations.  Our 
meetings  have  proved  that  though  our  friend  was  shut  out  from  the 
temples,  yet  "  the  people  heard  him  gladly."  Of  the  effects  of  his 
preaching  among  us  I  need  not  speak.  The  warm  feelings  of  grati- 
tude and  respect  expressed  on  every  side,  are  the  best  evidences  of 
the  efficacy  of  his  words,  and  of  his  life. 

Out  of  these  meetings  our  Society  has  naturally  sprung.  It 
became  necessary  to  assume  some  permanent  form  —  the  labor  of 
preaching  to  two  Societies,  would  of  course  be  too  much  for  Mr. 
Parker's  health  and  strength  —  the  conviction  that  his  settlement  in 
Boston  would  be  not  only  important  for  ourselves,  but  also  for  the 
cause  of  liberal  Christianity  and  religious  freedom  —  these  were 
some  of  the  reasons  which  induced  us  to  form  a  Society,  and  invite 
him  to  become  its  minister.  To  this  he  has  consented ;  with  the 
understanding  that  the  connection  may  be  dissolved  by  either  party,  , 
on  giving  six  months'  notice  to  that  effect. 

At  his  suggestion,  and  with  the  warm  approval  of  the  Committee, 
we  have  determined  to  adopt  the  old  Congregational  form  of  settling 
our  minister  ;  without  the  aid  of  bishop,  churches,  or  ministers. 

As  to  our  Choice,  we  are,  upon  mature  reflection,  and  after  a 
year's  trial,  fully  persuaded  that  we  have  found  our  minister,  and  - 
we  ask  no  ecclesiastical  council  to  ratify  our  decision. 

As  to  the  Charge  usually  given  on  such  occasions,  we  prefer  to  do 
without  it,  and  trust  to  the  conscience  of  our  minister  for  his  faith- 
fulness. 

As  to  the  Right  Hand  of  Fellowship,  there  are  plenty  of  us  ready 
and  willing  to  give  that,  and  warm  hearts  with  it. 

And  for  such  of  the  other  ceremonies  usual  on  such  occasions,  as 
Mr.  Parker  chooses  to  perform,  we  gladly  accept  the  substitution  of 
his  services  for  those  of  any  stranger. 

The  old  Puritan  form  of  settling  a  minister  is,  for  the  people  to  do 
it  themselves ;  and  this  let  us  now  proceed  to  do. 

In  adopting  this  course,  we  are  strongly  supported  both  by  prin- 
ciple and  precedent.  Congregationalism  is  the  Republicanism  of 


442  APPENDIX. 

the  Church;  and  it  is  fitting  that  the  people  themselves  should  exer- 
cise their  right  of  self-government  in  that  most  important  particular, 
the  choice  and  settlement  of  a  minister.  For  examples,  I  need  only 
remind  you  of  the  settlement  of  the  first  minister  in  New  England, 
on  which  occasion  this  form  was  used,  and  that  it  is  also  used  at 
this  day  by  one  of  the  most  respectable  churches  in  this  city. 

The  Society  then  ratified  the  proceedings  by  an  unanimous  vote  ; 
and  Mr.  Parker  publicly  signified  that  he  adhered  to  his  consent  to 
become  the  Minister  of  this  Society,  and  the  organization  of  the 
Society  was  thus  completed. 

•« 

OCCASIONAL  HYMN. 
DISCOURSE,  BY  MR.  PARKER. 

ANTHEM. 
BENEDICTION. 


';.;y 


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